npTech Fundraising Tech donation technology nonprofit technology nonprofit

5 Common Sense Approaches To Effective Nonprofit Digital Marketing

Gregory C. Holt

 

Image courtesy of Complete Payroll Solutions Image courtesy of Complete Payroll Solutions
Between your nonprofit’s website, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Youtube channel, Instagram account, and whatever else your nonprofit uses to advertise online, it can be hard to keep up. And because there are so many nonprofits utilizing the same advertising mediums to scout out donors, volunteers, and other constituents, getting noticed can be difficult. Just think about it, you’re fighting through 9,100 tweets per second, and adding to the immeasurable amount of data that is on the internet, you're one fish in an expansive ocean.

When designing your nonprofit’s digital marketing materials, thinking outside the box is important, but it is also important to think practically. Being flashy and eye catching is important, but so is effective utilization of the advertising medium.

Here are 5 common sense approaches to your nonprofit’s digital marketing strategy to help you get noticed, and take your nonprofit to the next level.

  1. Be simple

    Choose one, simple, straight forward, insight to build off of, and construct the campaign from there. This insight could be a statistic, like the percentage increase of a certain demographic, or the result of a specific behavior, like what happens when a certain demographic engages in an activity. Whatever the insight is, make sure it is clearly defined, then build your campaign from there.

  2. Be brave

    Pull your marketing team into a room and tell them nothing is off limits. Based off of your insight that was determined in step 1, come up with extreme marketing campaigns that are even, in some cases, highly controversial.

    For example, Unicef created a sweat machine that turned sweat into drinkable water to raise awareness that 780 million people worldwide still do not have access to clean drinking water. As a result of this aggressive campaign, over a billion people saw Unicef’s message online.

  3. Be human

    Connecting with the general public on a humanistic level can be the easiest or the most difficult thing for your nonprofit to do. Your fellow humans will often say one thing, then turn around and do another thing all together.

    If you were to encourage any individual to give to the poor, they will either do so, or not. Thought it is well understood that giving to the less fortunate, sentiment would be split. But, if you were to tell that same group that giving to the poor is a wretched idea, overwhelmingly people would argue that that’s an insensitive statement.

  4. Be about solutions

    Ensure your nonprofit’s digital marketing campaign is working towards a solution. This can be as small as alerting a neighborhood of break-ins as soon as they happen, or as grand as pressuring governments to make sweeping social changes. Whatever the case is, make sure there is a solutions to necessitate your campaign.

  5. Be curious

    Ask questions and never be satisfied with answers. Whether asking questions to your marketing team, your donors, or your board. Stay inquisitive and always search for the best answers to your questions. When constantly searching for answers to questions, you might be surprised by what you find.

 

Leave a Comment