Communication Archives - Rebecca White

#Tactic Tuesday

The more consistent and compelling your communications, the more and better your community will understand your work and its impact. And the more your community understands your impact, the more you’ll have engaged supporters.

As a small shop nonprofit fundraiser/communicator, I wore multiple hats and so finding ways to streamline work while achieving outsized goals was vital. One of the best tools I found is the editorial calendar. I put all my planned fundraising and communications work on one page. My team consisted of me, me, and me. So it was important that all my work flowed.

This simple Excel doc helped me avoid conflicts, create synergy across channels, and improve organizational visibility. Feel free to use and adapt to best fit your needs.

While there are multiple ways to approach creating your editorial calendar. For the first sheet, the calendar, the process I recommend is:

Input important, known events and vacation days in first. Do you have an annual golf tournament? Get that in. Do you take a vacation in August? Block out those dates. What do you have planned for year-end fundraising? Grants? Put the big-ticket items in first. These big-ticket items will inform weeks of communications.
Think about monthly themes you want to tie to. This could be specific to your cause, like Developmental Disabilities Awareness Month, a common theme like Back to School, or Mother’s Day. I always wanted to incorporate Talk Like a Pirate Day, September 19, but it never quite fit.
With your big-ticket items input, your editorial calendar is taking shape. Now take a look at the second sheet, Sample Month Brainstorming. This is where you will line the specifics for each month. You’ll rename each sheet to match its corresponding month. This page is where you’ll get into specifics by channel and deliverables. Again, feel free to use/adapt as needed.
Develop four to six evergreen pieces. Plans change, so always have content that is relevant at any time. What are FAQs in your field?
Leave room in your calendar for pop-up items.
Review your editorial calendar quarterly so that you can stay agile, but relevant.

While developing an editorial is a larger upfront lift, the work more than pays for itself in increased synergy, reduced stress, and improved organizational visibility.

Gaining Visibility in a Crowded Nonprofit Field

Last week I was headed out to the gym and found my car wouldn’t start. As we had recently moved to a new city, I didn’t yet have all my “regulars” in place. Luckily for me, I also have family here, so we jump-started the battery and headed over to their garage. A few hours later, I emerged with a fresh battery and a trusted place to take my car.

Why? Stellar communication while I was in the waiting room. Regular check-ins, quick updates, a couple of questions, and a nice place to wait made the otherwise annoying start to my morning comfortable. I shouldn’t have been surprised then by the hand-written follow-up note I received later in the week, along with a Seymour’s Garage magnet so I would have their contact information. Home run.

This same attention to communication is needed within the nonprofit community. With over 1.6 million nonprofits in the US alone, the field is crowded, and visibility is more difficult. You need your organization to be noticed and trusted. As with my auto repair experience, getting people to know, like, and trust your organization starts with stellar communications.

In this crowded nonprofit environment, I believe the best communication begins with storytelling. Want to let your community, volunteers, and donors understand and connect with your mission? Get your stories down and share them across multiple channels.

Leading with compelling communications is especially important as we head into end-of-year fundraising efforts. Stories help you demonstrate your impact and elevate your supporters, so you’re also hitting communication home runs.

Proofreading in 5 Easy Steps

Proofreading is critical to a polished finished product. Here are five steps you can take to create an error-free document.

1. Run your text through Grammarly, Pro Writing Aid, or a similar online checker

These programs are terrific for finding duplicate words, mixed up words (they’re or their), and misspellings. Both programs have paid versions, but the free versions can do the trick just fine. Check for:

Spelling and grammar errors
Readability
Plagiarism (requires the paid versions)

Don’t forget to run your subject lines, headers, and titles through the checker. People often forget to proofread the less obvious parts of the document.

2. Print it

Before printing, double-space the document to give yourself room for edits. And, change the font to Courier as the consistent spacing can make it easier to spot mistakes. Marking errors as you go using a blue or red pen can help you later when you’re making updates to the document. Also, if you have numbered pages, do they match your Table of Contents?

3. Read it out loud

Put a ruler or a piece of paper below each line so that you can focus on one line at a time. Reading aloud helps keep your eyes from jumping ahead and missing errors. If it sounds awkward, rewrite that piece of text.

4. Check for jargon and acronyms

You are familiar with the acronyms and jargon in your industry, but your intended audience may not. And some acronyms mean different things across different industries. For example, AP can mean Advanced Placement, access point, Asia-Pacific, and accounts payable.

5. Read it backward

No, not in JK Rowling’s way with the Mirror of Erised, with the letters in backward order. Start with the last sentence of your document and work your way back to the beginning. It is difficult to edit your work as you know what’s coming. Reading in reverse helps solve that issue. Stop at punctuation and double check that it is correct.

Bonus Tip: Ask a trusted friend to read through your document. Someone with fresh eyes who is unfamiliar with the text can often spot missed errors.

These 3 Website Errors Can Hurt Your Bottom Line

Typos
We’ve all mixed up your and you’re at some point. But don’t let that kind of mistake linger on your website. Typos and poor grammar can give the impression that you’re sloppy or unprofessional. Don’t let that happen to you. You may not have a writer on staff, but do have a least two other people check all the content on your website for spelling and grammar errors.

The Curse of Knowledge
It’s hard to unknow knowledge. As a result, we end up assuming that our website’s content is clear and straightforward.

When you have a deep understanding, you don’t remember what it’s like to not know that information or to remember how long it took you to gain that knowledge. So, you end up assuming everyone has the same baseline of knowledge around your work that you do.

On your website, that can lead to confusion for your visitors- an unwelcome result when you’re trying to develop a relationship with a potential customer. Help your customers out by:

Getting fresh eyes on your website- someone who isn’t from your industry
Offering case studies and examples
Using an FAQ page

Hide and Seek Contact Information
Do you want the people who make it to your website to contact you? Would you love the chance to convert that visitor into a customer? Don’t hide your contact information. 44 percent of users will leave a company’s website if there’s no contact information or phone number.

An easy solution is to have your Contact Us tab at the top of your homepage. Make it easy for your website visitors to take the next step and connect with you.

Improving your website is an ongoing process and critical to the long-term success of your business. Don’t let these three errors drive your potential customers to a competitor. Keep your website typo-free and easy to use and understand.

Prioritize Your Blog

As a business owner, you’re focused on attracting potential clients and making the sale. In today’s digital world, your clients are online, and they expect you to be as well. One impactful way to connect with your customer is through a company blog. Blogs can draw customers directly to your website, shorten the sales cycle, and boost Search Engine Optimization.

Consider these two stats from Hubspot:

B2B companies that regularly blog generate 67 percent more sales leads than non-blogging companies.
Companies that published 16+ blog posts per month got almost 3.5X more traffic than companies that published 0-4 monthly posts.

These statistics reinforce that your blog needs to provide relevant, engaging, and updated information each week. You want your customers, and potential customers, checking your website often.

3 Easy Topics for Your Blog

Announce a new product: Tell the story of how the product came about, what problem it will solve, and how people can get it. Remember to focus on the benefits of the product or service, not the features.

As Harvard Business School Professor Theodore Levitt taught us, “People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill, they want to buy a quarter-inch hole!”

Share a conversation you’ve had with a customer: I was recently looking for an easier way to clear ice from my windshield in the morning. The ice scraper I had was too short to reach across my windshield. I was leaning towards just making do until the salesperson showed me the de-icer spray. Now there was a product that could solve my problem, and I walked away a satisfied customer.

Introduce new personnel: Celebrate the people your customers will interact with in person or online. Your customers will want to know what a new hire means for them. Faster service? A new service? Highlight the new employee’s background and experience and let their personality shine through. You can also use a fun photo rather than a standard headshot.

Having a blog makes good business sense in today’s digital world. Having a blog on your website can differentiate you from your competitors, increase your online visibility, and attract more potential customers to your website.

Don’t forget to cross-post your writing to social media and let others help expand the reach of your great content.