Spring is in the air, which means the 2019 conference season is fully upon us. While thousands of marketers — including me! — spent last week in San Diego for Social Media Marketing World 2019, the nonprofit community convened in Lincoln, Nebraska, for the 2019 Cause Camp.
This year's edition of Cause Camp, one of Forbes' "Must-Attend Non-Profit Conferences of 2018," featured some of the world's leading nonprofit speakers, including Steven Shattuck, Chief Engagement Officer at Bloomerang; Julia Campbell, of J Campbell Social Marketing; and world traveling storyteller Branden Harvey.
If you couldn't make it to the event, luckily, many of the attendees documented their experiences on social media.
Here's a look at some of the biggest takeaways from the event, as seen through the #causethechange hashtag on Twitter.
https://twitter.com/JuliaCSocial/status/1110272014646943744
Here, Campbell quotes Bill McKendry, Cofounder and Chief Creative Officer of DO MORE GOOD, about the disambiguation of marketing and fundraising. In light of donor fatigue -- and general fatigue about all marketing, as social media only becomes louder and more omnipresent -- it's interesting to think about both the timing and juxtaposition of your marketing "air attack" and fundraising "ground attack," and whether or not it makes sense to stage them concurrently.
Use your platform for good in the world. Will anyone else make a remark about it? @BrandenHarvey #causethechange pic.twitter.com/jzMQaJa571
— Beth Wilson (@DBethWilson) March 25, 2019
https://twitter.com/DBethWilson/status/1110285245386055680
In this Tweet from Dallas-based storyteller Beth Wilson, Branden Harvey quotes one of Seth Godin's recurring themes, about content being remarkable not to the creator, but to the consumer. By going above and beyond for the audience — whether it's your donors, your sponsors, or simply your broader social media community — you will inspire them to want to speak not just to you, but about you.
This gets at the heart of one of the biggest issues confronting nonprofits' general marketing efforts: time. When you focus on creating experiences so great that people want to talk about it, and pair that with encouragement for them to share their experiences publicly on social media, you begin to build your reputation through the voices of your biggest fans. Retweeting compliments, or sharing a supporter's Instagram Story about you to your own story, is one of the most effective and efficient social media content strategies.
https://twitter.com/shandoesalot/status/1110584645295456256
This nugget from fundraising coach Shanon Doolittle quotes a theme from Campbell's presentation: to weave persistent calls to action into your stories. It can be tempting to use your digital platforms to push a variety of messages onto your audience throughout the year, but the message from Campbell is clear: the simpler and more consistent the call to action, the better.
This also ties back to the point made by Harvey: creating remarkable experiences that others want to talk about. The more structural variety you try and stir in to your storytelling approach, the more difficult you make it for others to describe what you are all about. In this complex and noisy world of social media, sometimes the simplest approach is the most effective.
https://twitter.com/TClarkNPO/status/1110192519269285888
Finally, Tyler B. Clark, Executive Director of the Single Parent Scholarship Fund of NWA, quoted Doolittle with a simple but powerful message: "Every person has a story to tell."
Life in the age of social media has empowered every single organization with the ability to share the stories of its people. When nonprofits don't get caught up in trying to reach more people, but instead successfully ignite a passion within the people that they're already connected to, success through storytelling is inevitable.
