Life after the Pivot
Storytelling to Refresh Your Nonprofit Outreach
Right now, everyone’s world is turned upside down with the pandemic. For companies big and small, we hear the term “learning to pivot.” Companies that once thrived at one product or service are learning to adapt their resources. Entire workforces are learning what it means to work from home. Everyone has had to become a kind of expert in “precaution.”
For nonprofits, this is nothing new. Nonprofits have been “pivoting” for decades.
When nonprofit programming is subject to a shift in grantmaking strategy your team is forced to “pivot.” When a funder no longer accepts applications for a program area – your team is forced to “pivot.” When your annual event does not make the cut for a key corporate sponsor – your team is forced to “pivot.”
Most importantly, nonprofits have been responding to everyone else’s changing situations. Nonprofits step in to support individuals, families, and their communities in times of change and in times of need.
All that pivoting makes nonprofit leaders and their teams uber resilient. They also know that resources are fluid – that shift if grantmaking strategy could shift back in their direction just as quickly as it shifted away.
How do you stay in front of audiences that might become increasingly important to your development efforts? How do you connect with new audiences with the potential to be a volunteer, donor, or board member?
What comes next?
Everyone is thinking about what the next phase of this new normal will bring. For many nonprofits, they have seen an uptick in donations. Longtime donors recognize that the need for services has increased dramatically, and the desire to do what they can to help has come from new donors. Community and corporate foundations have also responded by mobilizing to allocate dollars sooner and more broadly.
With all of this increased philanthropy, in a landscape that greatly restricts in-person engagement, how will you maintain a connection with multiple audiences?
Storytelling promotes the shared vision that strengthens your relationships. Today, there are so MANY platforms for storytelling. Add social media and video mediums to your traditional outreach like annual reports and mailings and you have a jumble of ways stakeholders can find you. It also means your messages are competing with many other messages – not just from nonprofits.
Time to amp up your storytelling
“Donor fatigue” is a very real and familiar phrase for nonprofits. Fatigue can also happen in your storytelling, too. Even though your team is likely scrambling every day, to respond to intensified needs in the communities you serve as well as respond to internal pressures of this nonprofit landscape, challenge yourselves to scrutinize how you are communicating with key audiences.
1) A snapshot audit of your delivery platforms
- Have you diversified how you engage with audiences?
- Are you relying too heavily on social media channels, what % of your audience is active on social media?
- Video: Are you not taking advantage of video because of a lack of time, lack of equipment or knowhow?
- Have you adapted messages you would include in a video for a printed piece?
2) Refresh your narratives
- Include staff from across the organization: what anecdotes are they hearing from participants or volunteers? What impressions can they give from boots on the ground experiences?
- How are you capturing new stories? Frontline staff can help you capture and document those mission moments.
- Does your team have what they need to collect new stories: can they use their personal phone, or do you have a phone or professional camera for impromptu interviews – audio recording or video?
3) Begin to think about post-Covid messages
- When you feel bogged down with the day-to-day crises, carve out a lunch hour to brainstorm and prioritize messages.
- Messages that were compelling six months ago may have shifted. Everyone is dealing with the pandemic, including your donors and volunteers.
- Give stakeholders a better understanding of your stewardship as you prepare for post-Covid programming. How will you adapt, how will you plan for their investment in your mission?
Nonprofits have important stories to share. These stories have the power to inspire, excite and support those vital to your organization’s purpose. Take the time now to prepare for messaging that highlights how you plan to use your own best practices as a map for the future. No matter how uncertain.
Yvonne Hundshamer is the founder of Blue Grotto Inc., a Minnesota-based business that works with organizations to document culture and values, celebrate milestones, and articulate vision. She encourages clients to think of the excitement and energy they brought to the nonprofit just starting out. And, to imagine harnessing that energy today, with an established brand and a history of success. Reach her at www.bluegrottoinc.com or yvonne@bluegrottoinc.com.