relationships
BIG’s Blog: It’s Relationship (Re-posted with permission)
Monday, April 28, 2014
Fundraisers have always understood, as much as leadership or the board, that their organization needs supporters.
Yet over the last 15 to 20 years, a bothersome, and, some would even say “nagging,” issue has arisen that has many fundraisers puzzled.
The same successful messaging and fundraising methodologies that they have perfected throughout their careers are not engaging baby boomers, much less even younger generations.
Starting with the boomers but also extending to Gen-X and the Millennials, these younger cohorts ARE NOT ENGAGING with many long-standing, established organizations.
Why?
Nilofer Merchant in her 2013 book, 11 Rules For Creating Value In The Social Era, seems to nail it when she writes, “If people give to a cause (mission or ministry), they expect a relationship, not a transaction.”
The “ethos” of these generational cohorts has changed! We are living in the Social Era and, today, that means they expect a relationship. This new ethos has firmly taken hold in the boomer, Gen-X and Millennial generational cohorts.
Commonly used Definition of Ethos- the fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs or practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period.
Nilofer Merchant isn’t talking about your grandparents . . . she is talking about you and me.
Drip, Drip, Drip.
~ Mike
Welcome to BIG’s Blog! Please feel free to forward this post to your friends and coworkers…and email me a comment at: mike@big-db.com
Posted by Mike Browne at 12:30 AM
BIG’s Blog: Evolve or Die? – Re-posted with permission
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
The “heart” of successful fundraising is still relationship.
When I talk to my 80-something mother about the “relationship” she has with the different organizations she supports, and I have essentially the same conversation about the “relationship” my 50-something wife has with the organizations she and I support, I quickly understand that each of their definitions of “relationship” is very different.
With my wife, relationship speaks to whom she knows, where they are working and what they are doing. Whereas with my mother, relationship speaks to the story or narrative she understands about the organization built up over decades.
My mother’s “know” is knowledge, the story, the narrative. No doubt the product of the mass communications paradigm we are quickly exiting.
My wife’s “know” is much more intimate and tied to the people and a particular mission and, yes, is driven by online communications.
We are quickly coming to a time when large monolithic nonprofit organizations like CARE, the Red Cross, and the American Cancer Society (and I chose these organizations because they are very large) are going to be under pressure to connect with new, younger generations of potential supporters in a much more intimate and personal way. And, to their credit, I am starting to see some signs of that move. For instance, following disasters, texting $10 has been very successful for the Red Cross, but the test will be how they follow up and develop these one-time donors into annual supporters … even without a disaster. That will take care and nurturing of the relationship.
It isn’t that my mother’s generation was easy and younger generations (beginning with the Baby Boomers) are hard. Rather, I think it’s more that younger generations are very different in what they look for and expect from the organizations they support today.
It isn’t harder vs. easier … they are just different.
Making a determination of “hard” versus “easy” is really more a reflection on what we know … our experience.
But this much is clear . . . going forward, relationship is going to be defined in a more intimate and personal way.
Drip, Drip, Drip.
-Mike
Welcome to BIG’s Blog! Please feel free to forward this post to your friends and coworkers…and email me a comment at: mike@big-db.com
BIG’s Blog: We Have Moved … Online (Re-posted, with permission)
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
BIG’s Blog: We Have Moved … Online
You read about it in the press, but you wonder . . . are companies and charitable organizations really moving online . . . and what does that mean?
Well, here is one firm’s perspective.
For over nine years, we have been working as a consulting firm with nonprofit charitable fundraising organizations, especially those that are overly dependent on direct mail appeals. Our fundraising clients understand that unless they start reaching the Baby Boomer and younger generations with a fundraising message and an online methodology that targets and resonates with these younger online generations, they face a steep decline in revenue in coming years. Time is not on their side.
For all these years we have been consulting in the traditional in-person and on-site service delivery model that people expect from consultants. And all the while we are talking to these fundraising organizations about the need for them (not us) to move online.
Well, this past January we opened a new chapter for Browne Innovation Group. We transformed our practice into an e-learning and online coaching delivery model that trains fundraising leadership and professionals in not only how to move their Development organization fully online and make it work, but why it is so critical for their future.
If we are going to “talk the talk” we had better “walk the walk.” Right?
So, yes, we put our organization “on the line” that ONLINE IS THE FUTURE.
The reaction?
If the current group of Development professionals and organization leadership that is now engaged in our online e-learning program is any indication… we made the right decision. Forgetting for a moment that fundraising professionals can now access our program information for a fraction of the price of the old, traditional in-person, on-site consulting model… the feedback we have just received from this first group of Development leadership and professionals has exceeded our expectations.
It isn’t just that our organization’s program is now online. . . it is that our clients are engaged in the online program! Did you get that? They are engaged online. And living the experience as individuals and as a Development team, they can relate to what is missing in how their organizations communicate, develop relationships, and ultimately develop financial support within the context of a virtual online space.
Hey, I’m 60 years old, but I’ve got my iPad, my iPhone and my computer. Do you somehow think that your “potential” Boomer supporters don’t act like me, think like me and can’t be engaged online? Or, should I say, “think like us and can’t be engaged online like us… you and me?”
I would love to have your organization join our next program, which begins in July. The best way is to learn about our program is through one of our free Webinars and I want to give my blog readers priority. If you are interested, drop me an email and I will see you receive priority status to attend.
Join us.
-Mike
Welcome to BIG’s Blog! Please feel free to forward this post to your friends and coworkers…and email me a comment at: mike@big-db.com
Posted by Mike Browne at 12:00 AM
http://bigthoughts4u.blogspot.com/2013/03/bigs-blog-we-have-moved-online.html
True Hospitality (Re-posted from the Henri Nouwen Society blog)
Strip away the religious aspect of this post, based on the teachings of the late Henri Nouwen and one can see the kernel of truth upon which all successful fundraising is based: RELATIONSHIPS. My thanks to the Henri Nouwen Society for this insightful meditation…
Daily Meditation: March 6, 2013
Posted on March 6, 2013 by daily meditation
True Hospitality
Every good relationship between two or more people, whether it is friendship, marriage, or community, creates space where strangers can enter and become friends. Good relationships are hospitable. When we enter into a home and feel warmly welcomed, we will soon realise that the love among those who live in that home is what makes that welcome possible.
When there is conflict in the home, the guest is soon forced to choose sides. “Are you for him or for her?” “Do you agree with them or with us?” “Do you like him more than you do me?” These questions prevent true hospitality – that is, an opportunity for the stranger to feel safe and discover his or her own gifts. Hospitality is more than an expression of love for the guest. It is also and foremost an expression of love between the hosts.
Text excerpts taken from Bread for the Journey, by Henri J.M. Nouwen , © 1997 HarperSanFrancisco. All Scripture from The Jerusalem Bible ©1966, 1967, and 1968 Darton, Longman & Todd and Doubleday & Co. Inc. Photo by V. Dobson.
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Mission Is Everything! 