How to start marketing your nonprofit?

Marketing a nonprofit organization requires a strategic approach to raise awareness, engage supporters, and attract donors. Marketing your nonprofit is essential to nonprofit strategy. For nonprofits with skinny budgets or limited experience, figuring out where to start and direct resources can be difficult. Fortunately, there are many resources for nonprofits here on NMBL Strategies’ blog and many free tools online. Here are some effective ways to market a nonprofit:

1 . Develop a compelling brand identity: 

Create a strong brand that reflects your mission and vision or values, and goals. Design a logo, tagline, and consistent visual elements that represent your nonprofit's identity. Having a cohesive and organized identity across various mediums (print, digital, etc) is key to ensuring that your organization is recognizable and memorable. Being organized is essential to building a compelling identity. This includes knowing your exact colors (with color codes), font style, using the same logo and applying that logo across your marketing materials, and not creating content that clashes with existing branding.

2 . Build an informative website: 

The first place most people turn when they hear about a new storefront, restaurant, and yes, nonprofit, is Google (or your preferred search engine). Having a well-crafted website waiting for searches can help boost your nonprofit’s image (and convert visitors into new contacts for your email list or even donors through your website). Create a user-friendly website that showcases your nonprofit's work, impact, and success stories. Include clear calls-to-action, donation options, and engaging content to keep visitors informed and inspired.

It is important to understand and use SEO to make your website more prominent in search results and boost clicks. Use analytical tools to, continually track and analyze your development efforts. Based on this tracking, optimize your strategies based to improve your marketing outcomes.

3 . Content marketing: 

Develop a content strategy to create valuable, informative, and shareable content. This can include blog articles, e-books, podcasts, and videos that educate, inspire, and promote your nonprofit's cause. Not every nonprofit can create every type of content, nor should they. It is important to find what type of content your organization can create and what content will best engage your audience. Whatever your organization chooses to create, it is important to understand how to maximize your content quality and impact and to remain consistent. 

4 . Leverage social media: 

Establish a presence on relevant social media platforms and consistently share compelling content. Use a mix of storytelling, visuals, videos, and infographics to engage with your audience, spread awareness, and encourage shares. You can use social media to spread your content to a wider audience. Social media is a great way to get more eyes on your content and mission because it is free and readily accessible to nonprofits and followers. 

5 . Email marketing: 

Build an email list of supporters, volunteers, and donors. Regularly send newsletters, impact updates, success stories, and fundraising appeals to keep your audience engaged and informed. There are plenty of programs available to help nonprofits efficiently conduct email marketing campaigns and stay organized (including Hubspot and MailChimp). Nonprofits can use email to welcome new supporters, promote campaigns or events, and to retain supporters through routine engagement. 

Nonprofits can also reach supporters through text campaigns. Texts are relatively inexpensive, often costing less than a cent per text. There are also great programs available that make large text campaigns possible for any nonprofit (including Twilio.org, which offers in-kind grants to nonprofits, and ExpertTexing)

Remember, consistency, authenticity, and effective storytelling are key to successfully marketing a nonprofit. Telling the story of why your organization chose its mission and what your vision is for the community is the single best way to improve your marketing. A compelling story is the bedrock of a quality nonprofit marketing strategy. Flashy marketing materials and effective outreach will draw eyes to your organization, but only a compelling story will secure donors, volunteers, and engagement. Engage with your audience, listen to their feedback, and adapt your strategies accordingly.

Need help with input for a strategic plan, business plan, or fundraising plan? Contact NMBL Strategies today to find out how our team can ensure your success.