I'm literally muted. I'm like talking already straight away
my earpiece and be like, we're live we're live.
should have gone with the headphones. Happy 2024 Friends is John, is this like your favorite thing that we do?
I think it kind of is like it was kind of keeping us going at the start of the year. Love seeing so many familiar faces in the chat. Thank you for starting off your year with us. Like yeah, we are so pumped for today. Tell us where you're calling in from colonists. What is this like a telethon or something? Yeah. We want to hear your tune in.
Yeah, just tell us where you are. I love that. Christmas told us that Ohio's in double temperatures right now. So that is really exciting. But oh, Kyle, good to see you. This is like a time where all of our favorite people converge and come in together. mando welcome. You're in my favorite state, Colorado. Oh, this is a good question. I think everybody knows John's on a national journey to visit all 50 states and all national parks. Where are you today? John? We're in the work. Can I call
it in from Miami, Florida. Any Miami folks in the house, I found the most amazing coffee shop. So we have to meet up and I would love to see you were in Miami, about to hit the Everglades this weekend. Yo, I'm loving all these places. Okay, so
we're coast to coast, we have almost 300 People who are joining us today to talk about nine nonprofit trends that matter in 2024. And y'all after 500 episodes, we've learned a couple things. And you all have educated us. So Lindsey Fowler, so good to see you in the teaching Well, friends, if you want a mental health episode that will be good for your soul. Go check out. So we are excited to dive in. Hi, we're Becky and John, if you don't know us, we're your best friends you've never met or have like in real life, but we want to be. And so we have spent all our career as nonprofit marketers, fundraisers, annual giving officers major gift officers, jack of all trades, there was a month we did get processing but
time.
But we've worked in healthcare and in higher ed and we just looked around. And we said why are we doing things this way? Could there be another way we launched the we're for good podcast in 2020. You all have brought us there and we are elevated up to launch We Are For Good PRO, which is our online community classroom that we hope you will join this year because it's going to be on fire with incredible teachings and learnings in community. And we're just so glad that you're here to talk about the trends that matter this year.
Yeah. And so here's the deal. If you don't already, subscribe to the podcast, go ahead and grab your phone. We have a QR code here. Because today's episode, I can't not call this an episode, right? When we hang out. This is an episode about the trends. We're taking nine weeks, don't be overwhelmed nine weeks to unpack these topics because they're just so rich. And we're tapping experts from across the sector, people that are doing the work, we're going to be elevating, who's doing it well, and talking you through this. So the trends, this is just a kickoff today of the conversation, but there's so much more to come. So definitely grab the podcast if you're not subscribed in your favorite podcast player. But let me tell you a little bit about how we've structured today. Because while we only have you for an hour, and we want to hear your questions, we want to hear your thoughts. We'd love to see this chat just explode throughout, we have questions to kind of tap the the voices of the community in the room because we believe so much of the power is when we come together in community and share what's working and what's not with each other. So what we're going to do, we're going to unpack the nine trends. And these, let me give you some context, we found these by threading together over 500 conversations most recently, the ones we had in the last year to say, what's trending, what are the shops that are not really stuck, but they're moving forward in the face of adversity? How can we kind of lift those topics and just put them on fire. And that's the hope of this conversation not to overwhelm you. That's the last thing we want to do. But I hope you feel inspired and uplifted of man, we can do this. And there's options, we're not just stuck, we have a lot of opportunity in front of us. So with each of the trends, we're going to come at you with kind of a definition of what we're seeing why it matters. Who's doing it? Well, we're going to pull in some podcast episodes, if you want to go get some immediate listening, we've got some conversations we've already rounded up. And then you know, we can't leave you with some pro tips. We've highlighted them in green, you're gonna see the green slides throughout. Just like if I want to take action if I want to do one thing today. With this trend, I can get activated around the pro tips. So hang around. We're going to try to get through this. So we have time for q&a at the end. But definitely we're going to share a pro bonus too if you want to go with this. For a full year of professional development inside We Are For Good PRO. Okay. All right. No further ado.
Yes,
let's do it. Need
a little bit of a drumroll unless you've been on LinkedIn and then you've already seen him this morning or if you've listened to our episodes, y'all these are the nine truck nonprofit trends that matter in 2024. I'm going to walk through them individually number One, it is no longer business as usual period. The days of that are gone, we are looking to a new future. Number two. If you can activate the one, you can grow a massive movement, we're going to be diving into how to do that too. Number three, y'all you know that retention crisis has been on our backs for a long time, guess what, it's an internal issue and an external issue. We're going to talk about how to deal with how to retain not just your donors, but your staff. Right now as we're sitting in this vortex number four media is going to scale your impact. And don't be scared by that. That's one that may give you trepidation but we are going to unpack it gently for you. Number five, you knew it was coming. Yale and the age of AI and new tech, we're going to make sure that it's as frictionless and as fearless as possible for you. Number six, if I mentioned frictionless, make generosity, frictionless. We want to teach you how to not have any of that donor giving abandonment because we want to make giving as simple as one click number seven, tap creators grow influence hold on to your butt's girl that's John, from Jurassic Park, is a new world with influencers in the Creator economy, we're going to be going into that deeply, eight engage dimensionally. And what we mean is that one way of talking to people is gone. We've got to elevate and diversify the way that we see our people and talk to them in number nine, you know, we're gonna come at this with mental health, with love with balance, we need to talk about our sector building whole leaders. Are you ready to dive in John? Yeah,
that's like your cliff notes. And we've had a surprise, one good thing. So you got to hang around to the end to see how these kinds of all thread together. But yeah, let's dive in to Trend number one, we're calling it it's no longer business as usual period. And y'all I'm we're fully aware, this is a little bit of a trite phrase, because we've heard it so much. But when we look around, and we see the conversations that are happening, this is really the moment to just own up to the fact that things are never going to go back to how they were. And it's the sea of change. But in that is an incredibly beautiful opportunity. And the organizations that are holding fast to their vision to their values, but really open handed to how the next few months or the next few years take shape are the ones that are dialing in their impact. And they are realizing that business as usual, is actually a really good thing. And so here's what we're gonna do with this, I want to hear from you. What's a signal that you're seeing in your office right now, if you're in a nonprofit shop? That's that the way it's always been done is no longer working anymore? Is there something because that used to be a trigger to us when we're in the shop, and it's still a trigger today? Let's be completely honest, when we say this is how we've always done it. I know after you know, we're for goods, only three and a half years old now at this point. But anything that we even have done from the beginning, it's a good time to just like question that what are you seeing in your office, it says, And the way we've done that just isn't working anymore, we'd love to hear it in the chat. And
maybe engagement, people are not responding. Maybe they're not coming to your events, maybe they're not opening up your emails any longer. What is the signal that you all are seeing that we got to change, and we got to adapt? Yeah, love to see. So
as we start to unpack this, and I want to see love seeing your comments coming in with integrating AI, the only way to show up is with a growth mindset. And if that is a new term for you, it is here for the taking my friends, like it's just simply the idea that we can figure things out like that we don't have to be a static diet, static object, we are dynamic, you know, we're all learning, evolving and growing. And certainly a lot of the concepts that we're talking about today are on the forefront of what's happening. And it's you know, we're all learning as we go. And so if you really learn lean into this power of self improvement, like how do you create rhythms in your life that not only personally how are you iterating and become becoming better just by optimizing things as you kind of figure out what works and what doesn't? How are we doing that in small shifts in our organizations. And you know, we've talked about this on the podcast, some but I love the idea of pilots, you don't have to change the entire trajectory of your organization, you can start with a small pilot, John, Gary did this really powerful episode at the end of last season where she was like, pilots are like the best kept secret. It's like, just try something to see how it works. And once you see momentum, then pour more resources into it. So we definitely don't want anyone to feel like you were moving away from the vision or the reason that you exist, but it's just like a chance to look innovatively. And so of course, you know, there's so many examples out there of who's doing this well, but I gotta mention the goats Seth Godin, who kicked off the podcast after being Yeah, right. He was at the nonprofit marketing summit last year, so honored to get to interview him appreciate the community boost team giving us the opportunity. But Seth comes in and he's like, Yo, you're nonprofits you should be innovating like this is your task. We don't know how to solve some of the world's most pressing issues, but it's on us to keep innovating and trying. So I love this quote where it says, What could we do differently scarily different, where we take responsibility for me that's what it means. To be alive. And again, if you come at this with a growth mindset, this is exciting times to think about this is our chance to evolve and figure things out differently. So as we lean into some pro tips on it's no longer business as usual, reflect on where your mindsets at right now. And you don't have to put this in the chat. But you can. Are you feeling overwhelmed by the change? Or do you feel like it's an opportunity? That's something really to like, kind of wrestle with and figure out where's your red black with that. And our antidote for that is to get in community. That's why we talk about community is everything is bedrock to our company, and just how that we want to show up in the world. But find a community of people that can really allow you to embrace cognitive diversity. And that's just the simple idea is that you don't want to surround yourself in some echo chamber, where everybody's doing the same things, talking about the same things. How can you surround yourself and be open to different ideas, which are gonna give you different perspectives, and also, PS have a lot more fun along the way. So again, stay true to your vision values will be open to how the tactics evolve this year, and it's no longer business as usual is number one feeling it right.
Ah, great way to start us off, I can still hear says saying quit doing, thinking about it the way you always word, the old way is gone. The new way is in and I'm just here for it. So number two, activating the one is going to grow your movement, y'all have you thought about your mission as a movement? Because you should. And let's talk about how does a movement start? It starts with one person. That is how you came into the we're for good community, it was probably a podcast, it was somebody reaching out and telling you about it, maybe it was a tag. It starts with one person, and the way that we engage them, the way that we onboard them. And the way that we see them and give them that sense of belonging is going to open up this incredible opportunity for you to gather many like minded people that are going to get in lockstep with your mission. So many benefits to that from so many levels. But first, we want to know what is a brand that you proudly consider yourself a rabid fan of can I give you one John, for me, I didn't even think I am a rabid fan of Humans of New York, if you know that. I own all the books.
I'm a subscriber,
I am. I am a Patreon member of Humans of New York $5 A month every time because I believe in helping humanity in the stories that fuel that. So drop in the comments, we want to see like what are you guys, a rabid fan of it doesn't have to be a nonprofit, it can be a major brand or a corporation, it could be a movement like meat to or an environmental cause. We want to know what the causes are in your heart. And why? Why do you do that? And that why is really what we're going to be diving into with this activate the one. So let's talk about it in the old way. And this is the way we were always taught it was really about viewing donor value based on what they can give us. And depending on how much they were going to give us determines how much time how much energy, how much of our reflection are we going to put back on that. But again, that way to to number two, number one, hearken back number one is the old way, the new way is viewing believers, not donors, believers, remember, believers show up with more than just money, they show up with story, they show up with network, they show up and bring their friends, they show up and volunteer, viewing believers value is based on whatever they can bring to the table. And when you start to look at the assets that are much bigger than what they can bring to the table financially. That is how movements grow. So let's talk about what how this plays out functionally. John, can you slipped to the next slide? Thank you. It's time to hand over control. And let me just tell you, as someone who is type A, and likes to control every little thing, this is hard for us. But can you pass the microphone? Can you pass a tactic like one of your stories, maybe giving somebody control of a peer to peer fundraising group that is really going to be paramount. You got to shift your mindset to community is a business. And cultivating this base is just as imperative as cultivating your major gift donors. And that really starts with creating that authentic, safe place of belonging, because we need to evolve in step with our believers, when they start to see trends, we need to recognize them when they see things in our mission, we need to lift that and point that back out. And so whatever your spaces, it could be your social channels, it could be email, maybe you have a digital presence like we do at the We Are For Good community.com which if you're not in there, Julie, please drop the link. We want as many friends to come in there as possible. But it's got to be authentic. People have to feel like they can be themselves. And then you give your community the gift of activation. And this is something that we're really going to drill down on this year is that we see so many incredible campaigns, so many incredible stories being told. And then we see nonprofits forget to say what they need at the end. And if you can make it simple, and you can make it tactical, that's something that somebody can pour into collaboration is going to be key on this one. And it's not just with your donors, it's going to be influencers, it's going to be figureheads, it's going to be volunteers. It could be a kid with a very powerful story. It could be your beneficiaries, your rabid fans, everybody has a role to play in movement building. And I want you to repeat that back to your board. Because your board has an active role in this, your volunteers do this is not on the staff to do because movements are people and they require many, many people. And then you're going to pair that community plan with some kind of an engagement strategy. And we're going to dive deeply into that. Because there are engagement signals going up that we don't think that a lot of people are recognizing if you can tap into that, it's going to unlock this movement. And if you're co building, you're iterating, you're listening, you're changing it up. And again, back to that first point, handing over control, it's going to blossom, it's going to bloom, and it'll ripple without even your hands inside of it. And that's when you know that you've truly built something special, and it becomes much more than a mission, it becomes the movement. So let's talk about like, who is into this right now. And I we love Darren Isom, if you have not listened to this podcast episode, please go back Darren is with the Bridgespan group. And he just has an incredible mind. And he understands movement building. And he says, because ultimately, if you have a sense of belonging and a space, you'll drive across town, you'll pay whatever it takes whatever the cost is, you'll go to these things that are not very interesting. Because you should be there this is you're creating FOMO for our rabid fans to gather around. And I love the way that this is playing out in different nonprofits. I think Darren has a great unique take on this. So let's talk about oh my gosh, how could I forget about this quote, when you think about movements in nonprofit, how many people are thinking about charity water, because they really came in and disrupted this, the entire sector. But I really want to read this to you guys, because I thought this was so paramount, that charity water takes this lens and he says, you know, we really look at this as a barbell effect. Like, if you can succeed at growing a grassroots movement, you can succeed at the other end, which means that they say the mass fuels the major. And so Scott is telling us, I can't go out and ask for a $10 million gift from our top donors over here in San Francisco, if I can't tell them that we have already generated. However many people who are coming in at the $10 $20 a month, we want their gift to catalyze and fuel more growth. And that's when the big partners, your major gifts come in with your rabid fans. And guess what the donor pyramid starts to become one line because we're all together in this. So let's talk about some pro tips. We really need to start with the people who already believe these people are already in your world during your database. Some of them may not be in your database, they may be just following you on social media. So dive into that data and look for behavioral trends. Who's opening your emails? Who's coming to things? Who's clicking? Who's giving, you know, for a really long time, who is constantly commenting on your socials, those are rabid fans in the making, then we need to build out a community journey for this. What does it look like when somebody comes into our house? What does it look like when they make a gift? What happens when they join as a social media follower, what happens when they join our email list, all of these triggers need to have some sort of a sense of belonging strategy that says I see you as the one and these can be automated. I don't want you sitting there all day writing emails to your Facebook followers. We want to automate this and make it easy, because we want you to lean into innovation, because the world is a noisy and crowded place. And but the world needs to hear about the specific thing that your mission is delivering. So niche is going to be key. If you are someone who builds play houses and jungle gyms for kids fighting cancer, there is a market for that you can ask for rock solid foundation, they have built an amazing movement out of that. So really, really lean into your niche. And then you're gonna have to embrace that grassroots organizing this is beyond peer to peer fundraising. And it's activating your movement to do all the little things honestly, that are on our plates. Because we don't have all the answers. We can't be the voice in the perspective of everyone. We need that cognitive diversity to help our movement feel that it's rich, diverse and different. And at the end of the day, we're going to measure and communicate that impact and remind people why they love us and why they're coming back because we're going to care for people. And because joy is a vibe, which I'm teasing that right now. Because when people feel cared for, when they see joy, which is always trending, that's something they want to keep coming back to. And that's what we want with your movement and your mission. So
yeah, this is gonna keep building. So number three is retention is an inside job. Anybody out there feeling this? What we're talking about is that obviously retaining donors is the way to build movements. You know, you can't just have the one that Becky just described, a one and done type deal, you need the believer to keep coming back. But we're not talking about retention just in the donor sensor and the believer or volunteer stance, we believe the greatest retention issue that very few people are talking about is that of our nonprofit staff. And so we're really putting a flag in the ground this season, to talk about this very issue of why is turnover so high in our sector? And what can we do about it? In a sector that's so built on relationships, it's so key. So I want to ask a question, what's the traditional nonprofit darling, I'll put this in quotes a darling project, that you would be willing to sunset at your organization in order to redirect financial resources toward finding and retaining talent. Because obviously, we're money is moving that is showing our intention, and showing that we want to put, you know, purpose and fixing that. So I'm really curious what you would have with this in this community, this question was crowdsource from our community, too. So somebody on the frontlines is asking this, because we're all trying to wrestle through what does it actually mean? So tell me, what would you put on the table to push toward retaining talent in your team, I want to hear it in the comments. But as we start to unpack what this trend means to us, is, for a sector that's built on relationships, we must build a culture that creates retention from the inside out. And this is very much a through line of we're for good from just everything from kind of our mindset of like the power of employee giving and kind of how that can revolutionize an organization when you get people that truly believe and understand the power of philanthropy. But it's also just because we've talked a lot about building what a marquee culture and I'm going to talk about the guys from historic here in a second with their example of when you build a really magnetic culture on the inside, it absolutely becomes a magnet to those on the outside, look at the scroll back up. Look at the brands, you know that we mentioned that pop up, there's absolutely fanatic people that work at these companies that make you feel all those things that you probably feel, or you walk into the Apple Store, there's a different level of ownership and experience are these, you know, businesses that are like Co Op, like we're right now in Florida. I'm like Publix is a vibe, you know, because there's ownership. And
that was this, this like clause. I had never heard of Publix until last year.
But I'm like, I think there's different when you have people that are just in it, you know, you feel that from the core DNA. So a few things to just like keep it simple. I saw a really cool post by Tim San Antonio, that said, Remember, data is people. And I mean, we champion that all the time. But I mean, are you looking at your retention numbers, not to just stat, but it's like, I mean, we're losing maybe more people than what we're retaining. And certainly I didn't include all the data in this particular presentation. But you don't have to look far to look at the Fundraising Effectiveness report. And other sources out there to shows across the board, all of our organizations are losing more donors annually than what we're retaining across the board. So this is like an something we really need to pay attention to. And to do this well, on the inside, we need to pay attention to our people. And there's kind of a double standard, this not just the people that are our donors, but are really paying attention to our teams. And I saw it in the comments earlier. So I want to lift this I thought this was really powerful comment, how are we onboarding? You know, how are we, you know, conducting exit interviews? How are we understanding the flow of what's causing, you know, maybe discord that was causing people to leave. So paying attention to your people knowing your KPIs, and we're saying inside and out, and we mean that of outside your organization, and inside your organization? Do you know the KPIs that really matter? And then really get intentional about building a plan and a culture around retention? So this is going to be a big topic on the podcast this year. So there's a lot of forthcoming conversations because we're really interested in it. But I want to lift the guys from historic that wrote a beautiful book. It's in the background of Becky's background every day that culture is my brand, right culture about my brand. Yes. All right here. So listen to this quote from Mark and Ted. We did some research on top performing consumer brands, and nonprofits that they had worked with even small businesses. And we found patterns. And what we found was that their internal culture was so vibrant and aligned with their brand, that it was both drawing talent, customers and donors to the organization in droves. Like this is a secret sauce by focusing on the internal retention, how we could grow our external retention. So here's some pro tips. And again, this is going to be such a huge topic. So I just want to whet your whistle for what's to come. But I love this suggestion from Mike Dirksen who is an awesome, incredible LinkedIn follow if you're not following Him, but go create a retention day. It helps set the tone inside your organization that retention matters. It's a time that you can work on either reaching out to people that maybe haven't retained recently or people that have recently re engaged with you. But it also doing that in community just talks about the idea of how are we How is this an important part of our mission? So really carving out a day to do that and Then building intentional plans for personal development and growth, really understanding and knowing the values of your team members for what they want to accomplish in their career, and how can you be shaping and checking in on that. And then I love Isla Malik, she has got such a powerhouse episode where she talks about creating rituals, around simple things around departures, or around celebrations or crises, things that help set culture and a way that allows you to express your values and ultimately bring staff together. So those are things that are controllable, but of course, we're going to encourage you to lean into a lot of just like the soft skills as well as checking in on people and making sure that you are not bypassing some of the more obvious thing sometimes
cutting all of the comments in the chat credit to you, Chelsea Baldwin for talking about rituals and celebrations before we had it up on the slides. But I do think that that is going to be such an important tenuous topic because we're in a bit of a leadership crisis right now within the sector. And we've got to start with our team. So Oh, Brooke, the expert on onboard coming in, it's so good to see you, my friend. This is such a great tip pro tip right here. So I'm gonna dive straight into number four, media scales impact. Anybody out there afraid of leaning into media? Don't we're doing it right now media is this exchange right now and you're on social media, that is an exchange. And we really want you to tap into it, because it's time to step into your power. And think like a media company, I can tell you that nonprofits, sometimes we're on the iceberg. And we're moving a little bit slower than everybody else. But I can tell you corporations have leaned into having their own media companies were watching the nonprofit tech companies tried to build their own media companies, nonprofits need to come along. And guess what, you're already there. You have content, you have assets, you have influence, you have stories, you have all of this that's completely ready to really amplify it and put it on fire in a media environment. So let's dive into this question. I want you to share a media outlet or maybe it's a personality, who's actively supported your org, like I put in Robin Roberts, with a Good Morning America, on Instagram, but who is connected? Who out there is using media to amplify are you working with an influencer? Are you working with somebody who's your local newscaster? Or maybe somebody that has a blog and a following? These are people who can amplify our mission. Sometimes it's traditional media. Sometimes it's non traditional media. Allison SSM health in St. Louis gets Cedric the Entertainer I wasn't expecting. And Tim, I see your question, we're going to make sure that you get all of the details. And you have my email address, Tim. So just
the transcript will be live on the landing page, though. So it'll be there for you afterwards, let's
talk about some key topics for this. If you can actually partner with media, it's going to increase your visibility and awareness in an explosive kind of way. It's going to lead to increased partnerships, collaboration, you're going to help grow your advocacy, those are going to be your ambassadors who go out and rep your cause on your behalf. It's going to grow your rabid fans, in addition, but I would say at the very base of this, it's going to expand your credibility and your trust. When people see something that flies past there, whether it's their screen here on their device, or whether on their computer or their TV, their Smart TV. There's authority in that. And so when you're telling good stories, and you're giving insight into how to help and how to be a part of something bigger, you're going to get that credibility and trust. It's going to provide content for days, y'all. And that is going to be something that we can absolutely piggyback on and cross promote. That means we can share that content, we can tag that content, we can celebrate that content, and we have so much opportunity and sometimes we will not have even if made it and that is a game changer in terms of time saving. It's also going to amplify Hello, your appeals, your fundraising campaigns, if you're hitting major milestones, if you're actually trying to hit some kind of a marker, or maybe it's a font, a volunteer or a letter writing campaign or something, these are going to amplify all of those little things that you want the masses to know about. And ultimately it's going to lead to new fans, new donations, new stories, new connections, new everything, and that is the app, the influence that we were talking about is the new way. And just remember, anytime you put a great donor story up there, maybe it's not even a donor, maybe it's a beneficiary. You are stewarding that humans experience. You're stewarding the gift, you're stewarding the story. And guess what you just built relationship equity and you did it in a public setting where everyone can celebrate them. And so You know are good friends and Plata. He's been on the podcast a couple times if you have not seen the uncharitable movie, please tune in and check it out, I can tell you community boost is going to have it live at the nonprofit marketing summit where you can watch it for free. So make sure to sign up there. But I love Dan because he says we need a new media. And we need to trade media for the nonprofit sector. Imagine a world where causes and generosity and compassion converge. And they can compete in this rich media where maybe you see Superbowl ads for Save the Children or UNICEF or I'm gonna say one of ours in here, girls with cameras, Amina is incredible organization, if we could take that and put it in the public sphere, the level of influence and connection that we can create is absolutely limitless. So let's talk about how we can practically do this. Number one, you know, your chief storyteller is going to tell you that number oh, we got a thumbs up. Give us something your chief storyteller says. You need to develop a compelling narrative for this. What is your story? Why does someone care? Why do they need to amplify it, you need to start looking at your portfolio that's not just filled with donors. It's filled with journalists, it's filled with influencers. It's filled with media figures. This is relationship equity that is going to pay large large dividends maybe not in the form of a cash but I ultimately believe it will lead to even bigger major gifts than you can get to the one we've cut embrace multimedia, it can't just be in this is Becky of you're talking my old press releases I used to fax to actually did that. how old I am sorry, in the 90s. You fax your press releases, but we are moving beyond that we are embracing short video we're embracing photos, quotes, blogs, multimedia is going to be a way to engage with everyone because we all don't absorb our content the same way, we want you to start thinking about creating media or influencer kits. And we're going to break that down in this episode if you listen to it on the podcast where you go deeper with our expert, because we want you to nestle them on your landing page of your website, which is driving traffic and you can actually see this, find the downloads and you can give someone exactly what they're doing St. Jude is doing this beautifully. FarmLink is doing this beautifully. You're gonna flex your social media like you never had before. And it's not just going to be a one way communication, you're going to ask for that feedback, we're going to have surveys and ways that we can engage. You can even offer exclusive content to one journalist one influencer and give them the skinny on that. But measure again am I going to end all of my trans with measure and communicate your impact back to your amplifiers, it's going to John's comment before which I have not heard since my grandpa said it whet your whistle, it's going to allow you to get a deeper partnership to let that message spread and spread and spread. And if you want a really good bonus episode on this, I would encourage you to go to Julie's very articulate passionate rant. That's what I call it. It was our season eight wrap up where she talks about what she sees as how media can be an influence for good and how it can be trending. So absolutely love that check it out.
I mean, if you're trusting us for the trends, and we're talking about faxes, and whetting your whistle, thank you for hanging with us. Because it's a perfect segue to talk about upskilling in the age of AI, because friends, this is us, you know, this is Wes right here with you that it's time to like figure this out together. So I gotta give a shout out to Evan Wildstein. I've seen him in the chat today. So this is a quote he shared somewhere. I wear so many hats. I don't know which one AI is gonna replace today. And I like live for that, you know, chat GPT rolls out. And I remember the feeling that like went through my body of like, oh my gosh, what are we going to do with our lives anymore with if AI just takes over? But here's the deal we want to talk about in a really constructive way. But before we get there, what's your orgs favorite AI tool and it's probably hiding and tools that you're not even thinking of right now. But if you have a favorite AI tool, we'll drop it Becky what's one of your favorite ones?
Okay, otter.ai I will leave it in the chat is what we use to transcribe all of our podcasts interviews and y'all I can go in there and say otter pick out the five most impactful quotes and drop them in here for me otter, create a synopsis into paragraphs of this entire episode. It is that quick.
I mean mine is Grammarly because lord knows I was not paying attention to eighth grade English just close on the comma splices and things like that. So I love Grammarly. There's so many I'm loving seeing the chat with Canva if you're not on Canva Pro, like grab that for free for nonprofits. Jasper is a great like content development when also Okay, so here's the deal when we talk about AI I don't want you to fall asleep If this is not your cup of tea, this is a year. And you've probably heard it in our voices already in this session today. But we want to focus on how can we upskill our capabilities in response to all the AI that's coming at us like at a breakneck speed. So we want to work smarter, not harder. And here we've again, we feel like the antidote here is a growth mindset. And the good thing is there's a lot of people that are really brilliant that are already doing this work. I think of like Mina das and Nathan Chapelle, and Mallory Erickson, they convene this really beautiful Summit, at the end of last year, fundraising ai fundraising.ai. Summit, we linked up a URL right there in the middle, that's going to give you not only access to a ton of content, if you want to, like just kind of get educated and figure out where we're at. But also to have a framework so we can stay curious, but really center the ethical concerns that really binds a lot of us together and the social impact sector. How can we use this for good? How can we make sure that we're not going to create more harm to the people that we're trying to serve, and for, you know, some of the wraparound effects of things that we don't really understand. So the other piece, once we know the frameworks, once we know we're going to learn and grow and be open to new tools. They mean, there's just this idea that there's a lot of things that we probably are doing that we want to get off of our plates, too, right. So I think there's a huge opportunity to get dialed in on what's the most important qualities and characteristics that we can bring to this sector. And it's our superpowers that are uniquely human. You know, it's the relationship building. It's the creativity, it's empathy and emotion. And scarily, a lot of the AI stuff can write really empathetically and emotionally. So how can you bring the human element to this, and lean into tech wherever it makes sense to kind of speed things along. So you know, we have a lot of examples, we started these conversations on the podcast, and we'll link them up. But here's a great quote from Nathan Chapelle. And if you're not following him, he's easily one of the world's experts on this topic. But the world is moving fast. And if nonprofits don't compete, they will be less relevant, simple as that. But we have to do it in a way that's extremely thoughtful, strategic and responsible. You know, it's an imperative that we not only embrace the technology, but do it in a way that, again, is uplifting our missions. And so that's why that framework is really important. But I think Nathan's call out here is that if we don't lean in, we are going to be so far behind like it is our time to step in and not get further behind in the tech that's coming at us and the opportunities. So what are some pro tips, you know, starting inventory, like figure out what are your routine activities, and it's probably things you're not even thinking of, I mean, we spent a lot of time reading episode descriptions or social content, that doesn't have to be the case anymore, you can get a head start, you don't have to start with a blank page with so many of the tools that have been dropped in the chat already. And a lot of the tools are probably already using AI or machine learning baked into them. So Newsflash, you're probably already using AI where you don't even realize it, which is kind of a good growth area to be like, Okay, it's not as scary as what I think. But, you know, really understanding and diving into prompts. And we don't have time today to go into this. But this is a word, if you haven't dove into this topic, look into prompts, like understanding how to really get the information out that you want to. It's all in how you're asking for that information. So understanding prompts, we're going to talk about this on the podcast more, but is a place that you're gonna get more value out of your time and more original and kind of like correct content that you're hoping to get from a tool like chat. GPT. Okay. Let's keep rolling. Right.
All right, number six, we are going to make generosity, frictionless. We are going to make generosity so easy that when you see your video for your nonprofit, somebody can click on it and make a gift instantly. So how in the heck are we going to do that many of you actually already are doing that. So let's start with a question real quick.
Sorry, be okay.
little pause pregnant pauses, good. Who's added a new one touch giving method to their organization that's been game changing, like who's using Apple Pay, who's using Venmo? Who's using Google Pay? Who's got I've seen some that have stock can transact stock. Whoever is doing this, y'all way to go. We are super proud of you for taking the leap. If you are not doing it, what's the one that you want to embrace this year, we want you to drop those in the chat for us because we want to see what you're working on. Now. I'm gonna make you go back. I'm sorry. But yes, I gotta go through the overview. Because really, we have a matter of seconds to capture someone's attention digitally. Somebody said this in the chat just a couple of minutes ago, which I thought was so brilliant. And so we have to make generosity frictionless before we lose them. And so let's see how this plays out. And I want to add one little anecdote here. Jr. from James Citron over at pledge if you don't know that pledge, it's an incredible fundraising platform. But he said every single time that you add an incremental fill to your giving form, you decrease conversion by 10%. And so I was on a call with him and he said, if you add the address field, you are decreasing your conversion by 40% because people just don't want to wait and stick around that Long. So we've really got to get in this mindset of how do we increase that donor conversion? How do we make generosity so frictionless and mobile first has got to be the way to go. And so please start looking at your website, you're giving forms, how arduous are they? How long does it take to people have to refill points out? And you're giving form? Or is it as simple as picking up the phone? And just saying, yes, Google Pay, I want to make a gift to this organization right now. Because the aim is for that one, click giving. And we got to diversify. The way is to exempt a variety of giving options. And I want to give everybody like a warm hug right here because it can be overwhelming. Can we talk about that, John? Like as somebody who's not a seasoned tech gal, it's like, how do I get my operations up to accept Google Pay, maybe it's been mo or cash app, or whatever we're going to do. And it's like, take that elephant, eat it one bite at a time, try one this year, y'all, I would even say maybe try to and do an A B testing on which one can convert the most. Because we really want to provide that user friendly experience. And we want people to feel like they can come into our house, transact the gift, eat instantly. And then guess what we put them into that, that journey that we talked about and activate the movement. And if you can make it so simple, and so easy, guess what? It's going to encourage your repeat giving, it's going to reduce all those abandonment rates from adding all of those different fields that I probably want to add, because I want to grab a story from it. But I'll wait, John until the second time. And it's really going to help us to adapt to the different generations giving habits what my mother who is a boomer gets to is not the same as what my nephew uses when he pays. And so we went deeply into this conversation with Vance Roush really at the end of season eight. And he said, why are people not giving to your organization, because we've made it too dang hard. We have not connected the dots for them. And there is very easy tech for this that can integrate into your systems. And guess what, if you don't have the tech capabilities, you don't have the funding for it. There are a lot of platforms out there that can do this for you. So let's talk about some pro tips. Because I think give butter is an incredible one. I think pledge is an incredible platform. And so here's where to start, I want you to practice by giving to your own organization, I want you to do it on your desktop. And then I want you to do it on your mobile phone. And I want you to map out what the experience is like, then I want you to look and see, where were the holdups? Where did I get stuck? Where was the where was the experience, maybe not as seamless as I wanted. Because then we're going to optimize and utilize those online donation platforms, you know, that you already have, probably, if you have a database that are built in, we're going to optimize that website and donation pages so that they can accept mobile devices. If you're not doing a recurring giving program, you're probably shooting yourself in the foot right now. Because recurring giving is really going to be what we think the future basis of giving in the annual giving sector. And guess what, once somebody puts their credit card on and kind of it's a set it and forget it for a lot of people. And so you've already got their information in it's on you to get them to, you know, increase their giving, or go back to them and make sure that they feel impacted that I really encourage you to explore text to giving services. I know our friends over at Wings in Oklahoma, are using this with events, they're doing it with campaigns with a lot of success. Social media platforms already had giving options Facebook, it's already built in. So anything with meta is already built in. You don't you just have to turn that function on. Again, have I said optimize donation forms enough because I want to. And then at the end of the day, we want to make sure that you're clearly communicating the security measures that you have in place, because we want to keep everybody's financial information incredibly private, and tight. And we want to give donors that confidence that we're prioritizing that. So
if that section took longer than a day is to make a gift on your side, right? Like we've got to like fix this. Okay, number seven, we're kind of starting to round out here is a huge opportunity is to tap creators to grow influence. And so this this is here, the creator economy has been here, it's upon us. But like a lot of things. The nonprofit sector is a little bit slow behind other industries to get here, but it's disrupting everything we know about how people trust and consume traditional media. And you know, last year and every one of our trends discussions, we always talk about trust because when you look at the Edelman barometer trust, nonprofit trust across the board continues to decline year after year. And it's a huge cause of concern with a relationship business trust is paramount. So we have to be looking at what are the ways that we can cut through and partnering with influencer creators is a way to kind of disrupt that writing their trust that they have with their audience to get into the game. So, let's ask you a question. Who out here is used an influencer to amplify your mission, love to hear how it works, the good, the bad, the ugly, you know, the safe space here, I want to hear how working with an influencer or creator went for you. Okay, so as we do this, we're starting to run out of time. So I'm gonna go a little bit faster. But to give context, the creator economy is projected to grow, get this to a half a trillion dollars by 2027. Yeah, truly baffling, but this is something that absolutely want to pay attention to. And I love that I can try to feel young in my millennial illness. I'm seeing other millennials in the audience today. I mean, this is a primary way that we're making buying decisions and a lot of ways in terms of what who you know, what you prefer, and kind of what's in your head. You
see that the cosmetic industry influencers have now usurped, like the cosmetic brand and the celebrity brand, they can sell more cosmetics influencers than the actual brand. It's the wild wild west.
So how do we kind of like activate around this? Again, we always come back to mindset work, we need to understand and recognize that these are in a different category, but they're major relationships that we need to prioritize. So how do we create space strategy to nurture? I'm not saying put your major gift officer on it, I'm saying, in your shop? Are you looking at it to say, what is our mission? What are we trying to accomplish with partnering with some creator to help marketing his mission to help change maybe the narrative in our community about something or to change to break down some walls? There's other ways to partner besides just finding a transactional money kind of exchange. And so that's where the superpower with this is. But value alignment is everything. And that trust is everything because Becky's talked already today about the power of niche communities. Well, that's where micro influencers really have all this momentum. They've already gathered people. So how can you partner to really get in front of those people? So there's we're starting to see some overlap with the previous trends. But are we ready for these type of relationships with the way that we have kids kind of prepared and are we, you know, kind of working in that direction. And so some examples, we've had some amazing conversations with people in this space, just this slide alone, I'd say those four people right there are making some serious waves in the sector, from Karolina Garcia, Jai RAM, who I'll lift in this quote, she's leading the Elevate Prize Foundation where their mantra is to make good famous, but they're actually using the power of fame, celebrity influence, to drive impact and to help equip grassroots nonprofit profits with like the storytelling capabilities. So they can get more media coverage, they can make partnerships with influencers and whatnot. So I mean, they're working with the Streamy Awards, and CNN Heroes, and they're just like, kind of disrupting the sector. And Nick Lynch, who is pictured on this, but not cited here. Nick Lynch is, you know, starting to have these conversations on his own podcast, He's launching a book this year. So there's a lot of information and content coming at this topic. What are some pro tips? You know, we have to evolve beyond just like vanity metrics, like it doesn't necessarily mean follower count. I saw it in the chat earlier, everybody is an influencer. And so it's really about what is that engagement look like? What is the trust level with their audience? Is that going to help you kind of speed up the ability to gain trust with a new group of people? Authenticity is everything. I saw this in the chat also, like, I feel like we're surrounded by value aligned people here on this today. But you want it to be an authentic relationship. And then you want to give the control of the messaging to the Creator, we're not trying to control these are not puppets. These are partners, you know. And so how do we kind of activate and make really authentic engaging content to open up whole new areas? We have case studies coming at you this season, specifically with charity water, and how FarmLink has done it, and so really excited to unpack this.
All right, number eight, it's time to engage dimensionally what in the heck does that mean? That word is a little bit. And we're partnering with our good friends, the Arkady group on cross promotion and getting more data on this because they're already diving into the data of engaging dimensionally, because it's time to understand the complexity of our donors needs. And I would even go further and say, not just our donor, but our lurkers, our believers are rabid fans. We need to know how they want to connect and engage with them. They're on that more personal level. So let's talk about this question here that we want to pitch to you guys. And it's what's one new behavioral metric, you're going to be committed to starting this year. And so when you engage dimensionally, it means we're going to look at data in a completely different way where from Oklahoma, we call it data, not data. So what is that going to be? We're not just going to be following what they're giving. But what sort of behavioral metric Are you going to follow? How many likes are you getting? Who's opening your emails, who's hanging out on your website? These are things that are all engagement signals for how to engage dimensionally. So we need to get outside of that financial transaction as the sole source of truth, because that doesn't tell us everything about our donors. In fact that tells us very little about our donors. It just tells them that they crossed the line to come over and invest, but their behavior, why they came, why do they want to stay, that is what we need to dive into to sustain and build that retention culture we talked about. And Trend number three, we got to evolve to personalize, and we've got to understand how data, all of these tiny little data points are going to build to understand how to start engaging our donors. We're going to leverage all these advanced analytics to better understand donors. And we're going to look at predictive modeling, which is a scary thing for me. I didn't even know what that was probably five years ago. But we're going to be diving into how to do that simply and how can it help? And then we're going to be thinking about how to integrate all of these dimensional thinking into our strategies. How do we look at our annual report and say, we're not just going to nail this, we're going to take components of it and break it apart, we're going to make sure we're going to do something different in hand deliver this to our board with something that says X because they care about it, we're going to think and engage dimensionally and differently this year. So let's talk about like, who's talking about this and who's looking at this? Oh, my gosh, he just joined the chat. Did you know you were in our presentation, pm is so brilliant at this, he is with stop soldier suicide right now. And he is worked with IJM International Justice Mission, and so many incredible nonprofits like new story building donor journeys. And he has been in the thick of this. And he says, Think about those who will be your advocates and ambassadors but won't necessarily give, they're still incredibly valuable. So we've got to watch their interactions, and then give them a role with a call to action that is not just around giving, these people are actually going to come back. They'll give more in the future, but not just monetarily. So I really think diving into these data points is going to be succinct. So let's dive into a couple of these pro tips. Is your database clean? The answer is no, we all work in nonprofit, it's never going to be completely cleaned up. But we do have to get it in a position where we can flex it for good. We're gonna have to do segmentation surveys, a B testing, we're gonna have to monitor all of our personalization, and who's coming to events, keeping our eye on social media. And all of that is going to show these engagement signals that we need to engage in the future.
All right, I mean, I am loving and living for this chat that's happening. So just supportive group here. And with Sonia Lauterbach in the in the chat today, we were rounding out with number nine, our sector needs hold leaders. And it's probably not surprising, if you hang around, we're for good. Like we care deeply about your mental health. It's part of our very DNA for why we wanted to start this. And we feel like this is a moment that if we want to transform the world we live in, we have to start and begin every day from within. And so I want to create space and just ask a question as we start to round out, when you think of hold leaders, what attributes come to mind, and really excited to see what you can chat to and there it is personalization segmentation. There's a little bit of a delay on our end. Well, let us continue to to answer that because we'd love to open the topic of whole leadership. But first, you know, table stakes is that everybody here is a leader, everyone has a capacity for leadership, regardless of title. So we're not, you know, launching this trend, saying the executive directors need to be hold leaders, like each of us need to be hold leaders at whatever role that we're at. And so it's really often in the community of people that, you know, we're friends with, as fellow small business owners that serve the sector to people within nonprofit organizations that are our friends, it's really easy to neglect our personal needs. For the lack of the greater good. I think it's really hard when we're such joined with like, we want to do more, we want to serve more, we want to help and we see the need so deeply. But that lack of well being is sabotaging our efforts. And it's making us less effective. And so the real talk that we want to deliver is to be a good lever leader, you have to be a hole leader. And so we've had some conversations about this on the podcast, of course, we dedicated Mental Health Week in the fall to these conversations every year. But here's a great quote from Jennifer Mulholland. And if you're not following plenty, oh my gosh, please follow follow plenty.
I don't know if they're here. You need in your life, I promise.
Yeah, they've got an amazing book that's launching this spring and they have a podcast rich with resources. They've done a guided meditation on our podcast feed so we can maybe even drop that in the chat. But here's what Jen said, the way to heal ourselves to heal others to thrive in an organization to help our teams and companies be the best that they can be is to take care of ourselves first. We cannot give from what we don't have. And it's really awkward for us to to be at the helm of these conversations because we're doing this in real time and trying to push each other to do this in real time. So we're not preaching to the choir. We are the choir with you guys. So here's what hold leaders really look at. They're prioritizing self reflection. They're prioritizing that well being, and they're recognizing what limiting behaviors and they're going to confront them. So obviously, this is going to allow us to dream bigger, it's going to allow us to really lean in value and inspire and motivate our teams as a result of it. And so I want to leave you with some pro tips, because we're going to round this out, but just are you making space for reflection and creativity. And I think I'm a creative at heart. And so this is huge for me, when I create that space, like, I'm so much more joyful in my work, and I'm so much more aligned with what really needs to get done, and create space to look at things with a new lens. So so much of the stuff we talked about, is going to be like on fire if you can create space for reflection. And then secondly is ask for help. You know, we've dropped the community several times we're forget community is full of just helper type people that are gathered that want to whether they're in a business or they're in a nonprofit, they just care about amplifying good, like there's community ready to be a help to you and just to be a friend and the journey. And then just like find inspiration. I mean, for us, we're big podcast listeners. So we love to like queue up podcasts that are allowing us to feel the uplift, but books and nature. I mean, I'm on this family journey to see more nature because there's something that happens in us when we go out and just step into the awe and the wonder of, of nature. So friends keep fighting for yourself, you are worth it. We freakin believe in you. Can I say that on a webinar? I guess I just
can't believe you almost cuss like this is a new world. This is the wild wild west it's here.
But that's, you know, really what we wanted to round out with. But Becky, don't you have like a surprise one good thing. I mean, we always have
just a little bit I mean, to give you a chance, you know. But here's here's the Becky love that you need today, I want you to know that you are worth everything. Well, everything that you're doing right now is enough. I want you to take care of yourself. I can tell you, I'm trying to take care of myself too. And I am living it out real time. But there is an antidote to all of this. There is something that hits all nine of these that can make them explode and amplification. And John it is a
party said it. Oh crap.
I will add the one good thing in there. It is a one good thing. And it is. I've already said it. Joy is a vibe, y'all. It is always trending. And in this world right now where it's incredibly divisive. And there's so much rhetoric and sensationalism hitting our headlines, we need your joy, we need you in our inboxes we need you in our feeds, we need to know what's joyful, we need to know there's hope. And we want to know how to be a part of it. So make sure that when you put that joy out there, tack that activation to the back of it.
And it's like I mean, it's almost like a game, you could associate joy with each of these if you go back and just like from the beautiful opportunities that really are in front of us to just pouring into ourselves and the way that we share media and our stories can bring joy and that centerpiece. So really love having the overlay. And we're going to keep looking at that as we unpack the series on the podcast. But um, we're gonna have a little bit of I mean, a couple of minutes, we're happy to stay on for a couple extra minutes to answer questions, but could have missed the opportunity not to invite you into community with us. We do this all year long. So if you've enjoyed this session, and thank you for the kind words that we're seeing, we would love to do nonprofit capacity building in community with you. And so what that looks like is we take our best content from the podcast. And we set a time time every month that we can grow in community. So we'll have live webinars either hosted by Becky or me. And we go through the topics listed here. So we start with the beginner's mind, yes, I worked in in your giving for like 10 years, but I still am learning everyday about annual giving. So we talked about these different topics, you'll be surrounded in community. And we have a special promotion going on right now. For the first time, through the month of January, where you get 12 months of access to We Are For Good PRO. So it's our streaming platform, you get the live events with me and Becky on a monthly basis. We already have a library of like 60 Plus webinars that you can stream featuring some of these amazing people right here on the page, you get discounts and access to kind of our special events throughout the year. And it's only $297. So we would love for you to help fuel this movement. You know, the Impact Uprising of we're for Good is a lot of free content. And so this is a direct way that you can power it and join with us as partners to do capacity building and community. And so we'd love for your consideration. Go to We Are For Good pro.com/ 2024 And this is going to be such a fun year like I can't it
is going to be such a fun year come back. We're going to be dropping episodes around all nine of these and going deeply into them. You're going to see them all throughout the year. We've got incredible partners. And y'all I didn't John, I didn't tell you I'm going to do this but I am going to do this. I love it. I mentioned Honi Humans of New York has a Patreon Are you guys aware we have a Patreon coach when our good friends we don't ask enough we want to keep our content free for $5 a month. You could come in $20 a month come join we're gonna give you free exclusive content because we create good briefs just for our our good friends. Please if you want a way to really help we're for good cumbia. Good friend join Pro. Keep listening Dang, you're gonna keep getting warm hugs all along the way. And you're gonna get cheerleaders here who are going to teach you modern nonprofit strategy as it's unfolding in real time. We love you guys so freakin much. That was your word, Jonathan, more often. And so appreciate you being here, drop any more of your questions in the chat. We're happy to hang on, as long as it is, what is the process to onboard? I
love it. So I'm gonna give a shout out to Abby Fox on our team. So she's actually put together like an audit, like a survey that you can fill out that kind of ask you a few questions about what your interests are, what your priorities are. And that survey will queue up a little mini playlist of where to start with pro because one of the feedback we get is like where do I get started, the monthly live events that will be happening this year, a great place to gather and connect and find other people and obviously get to join us live. But the pre recorded content if you take that survey tool when you join Pro, it'll kind of give you a playlist of things that will be interesting to you. So that's available in the We Are For Good PRO community that you get access to.
And we'll make sure if you go to this link, we're going to lock you up with all of these slides all of these transcripts 10 Win win so in please tune in next week we're going to be diving into can we tease our guests there are so freakin incredible for number one
for this year, number one
for business not as huge today. We are bringing on Brett Hagler, the CEO of new story, new story and if you all know news story, they're all about disruption and not doing it the way things are. So come check that out. It's going to be dropping soon and we're so excited you guys were here 2024 You guys got this Can I endlessly hearts because NAC has a vibe on this. So we are rooting for you guys. Thank you for coming and spending your day with us. Now let's go kick some butt and grow some movements, y'all. We're rooting
