105. SPN How to drive value

No technical expertise required

Jun 16, 2024

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In this week’s SPN:

Practical approaches to cultivate an AI-driven culture of innovation + how to take action
“Must-have” automated cadences + how to deploy
Jobs that took my fancy this week

Let’s dig in!

Foster an AI-driven Culture of Innovation

AI requires a champion - in the right places and for the right reasons.

But how do you cultivate a culture of innovation that unlocks real value for your Org?

Hint: It’s not about having the largest tech teams or the biggest budgets.

What sets AI leaders and AI laggards apart is a strong culture of learning and experimentation at every level of a nonprofit. That’s what really moves the needle.

I’ve met nonprofit leaders who feel pressured to become AI experts overnight. On the other extreme, I’ve also chatted with many who are handing off AI to the “Tech” people to “figure it out”. I don’t think either approach makes too much sense.

You don’t need to master the complexities of AI algorithms in order to effectively drive AI initiatives. What you do need is a solid grasp of fundamental AI concepts and a clear vision for how AI can strategically benefit the business-side of your Org.

Here are 3 approaches that are working well for teams I’m working with today:

💡 Nurture Continuous Learning

📈 Create an AI Roadmap

📖 Change the Narrative

Continuous Learning Environment

Focus on raising your team’s AI literacy and cultivate a mindset of continuous learning.

Some approaches to consider:

Use workshops, webinars, and expert talks (online/offline) to spark interest and demystify AI.
- I can vouch for the Google Cloud Skills Boost beginner and intermediate Gen AI learning paths.
Encourage experimentation, learn from failures - celebrate the learning, not just the successes.
Lead by example by sharing your own learnings. Record a Loom of yourself sharing your AI learnings from a workshop or how you’re using a tool. Post it your internal channels. It’ll get watched, people might start to do the same - be the AI champion.
Establish a reverse mentoring system for AI, pairing more AI-savvy employees with those just starting their AI learning journey - especially senior leaders.

Create an AI Roadmap

Develop a plan for AI adoption that aligns with your Org’s objectives. (Supposition - your Org has clearly stated objectives that are often referenced and understood by all).

Share the plan with peers/teams to provide input, clarity and direction.

Some practical tips for effective roadmapping:

Break down the roadmap into phases, with clear milestones and metrics for each phase. Measuring (and showing) progress in the beginning makes everything else so much easier!
Create an internal AI learning hub with curated resources, case studies, and learning paths for different levels of expertise. Make this easy to find, reference and use.
This is a fast developing field with changes to the landscape happening regularly. Review and adjust the roadmap often. And talk about it. Treat it like a real roadmap for a road trip. Keep the goal fixed, but stay flexible in your approach to reach it.

Change the Narrative

Flip the script on AI. Focus on *augmentation* rather than automation. Highlight how AI can take over mundane tasks, allowing people to focus on high-value activities.

Tackle common AI myths head on:

Regularly showcase real-world examples of how AI is augmenting and enhancing roles and responsibilities - especially in content creation and design work. Make it relatable and concrete.
Encourage open dialogue about AI concerns. Dispel myths and build trust. It’s also an opportunity for leaders and champions to say “I don’t know” and bring people along for the ride to find out together.

The future is not about AI replacing marketers or fundraisers. It’s about learning, understanding then deploying AI to empower us to get more donor-centric and drive higher lifetime value from our audiences.

AI needs to be seen as a strategic asset that propels your Org forward, rather than just a tool or quick fix to perceived slow work. Every Org needs an AI champion. Raise your hand.

Begin with small projects that can yield quick wins. Start small, but think big.

Jobs & Opps 🛠️

National Gallery of Art: Head of Digital Content ($164,000 - $191,900)

Planned Parenthood Federation of America: Director, Direct Response Marketing & Program Management ($125,000 - $135,000)

ALSAC/St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital: Director, Direct Marketing Strategy

Operation Smile: Development Director

JDRF International: Development Director, Peer to Peer

Make-A-Wish Foundation: Director, Celebrity Fundraising ($107,561 - $132,870)

The Good Food Institute: VP, Impact ($165,100 - $173,400)

Doctors Without Borders USA/Médecins Sans Frontières: Senior Digital Marketing Manager, Advertising ($101,800 - $127,200)

“Must-Have” Automated Cadences

Most Orgs use the same cadences and they’re usually always email:

Thank you post-donation
Some standard regular impact reports for monthly donors
An occasional donation request throughout the year
An emergency fundraising ask with a “we need your support right NOW” pinned at the bottom
Many not-so-occasional bright, flashing, red CTAs throughout December

These emails usually include the donor’s name, the program area they donated to, and sometimes a date of birth or an address.

They don’t lack personalization - a term that got distilled to a “fill-in-the-blanks” colorful template - but they lack diversity.

Nobody stands out in a sea of Orgs contacting the same persona with practically the same content – in email, direct mail, or a digital reactivation ad.

SPN readers will know I take a ton of inspiration from the for-profit world – the “abandon cart” cadence from ecomm being an obvious and simple way to increase the conversion rate for potential one-time donors quickly. (Talk to Fundraise Up)!

Here are 3 value creating examples of automated cadences I’ve run that can be easily absorbed into different stages of the Donor Lifecycle:
Milestone Achieved
We Miss You!
UGC (donor generated content)

Cadence 1: Increasing loyalty for existing regular donors, or “Milestone Achieved”

Spotify mastered this cadence with its brilliant “annual wraps,” which consistently go viral on Instagram and TikTok when released. Nothing crazy complex - they summarize every user’s listening chart over the last 12 months with fun statistics, such as “total minutes listened to your favorite song.”

Every December Spotify’s rankings in the AppStore – a function of both new downloads and current users’ engagement – drastically improve.

What’s the lesson?

Send donors an email every year on their anniversary date. This is bare minimum.
Alongside the standard “thank you” message, include the total amount given by the donor in the last 12 months or over a lifetime.
Supplement it with perhaps less relevant but eye-catching stats – such as which percentile of givers they belong to (“this year, you gave more than 76% of our donors in your state. Thank you!”) or how many times they read your email or visited your website (your email platform can automatically source this data from the web analytics tool).

A further example of the same cadence is Starbucks and its “journey of collecting stars.” Same for travel carrier loyalty programs. How do we capture the fervor in our fundraising that every management consultant applies to flying from NYC to Charlotte via Alaska during the last week of their annual airline membership in order keep their status for next year?

Most Orgs have internal definitions of “mass,” “mid-level,” and “major” donors. Those operational labels have nothing to do with donor engagement – but the same concept can be used for both purposes and this is a tactic for upgrading giving:

Define the lifetime donation amounts for the “Bronze,” “Silver,” and “Gold” tiers. Most donors - especially millennials and younger - can easily associate these three words with a loyalty program, so adapting them in this context makes sense.
- Ideally, to appeal to a broader range of donors, keep “Silver” and “Gold” amounts lower than internal “mid” and “major” donor definitions. For example, define “Silver” as $250 and “Gold” as $1,000.
In the “thank you” email after a first monthly donation, include a “progress bar” with the starting point at bronze, highlighting “prizes” donors would receive at Silver and Gold levels.
- Send a monthly update after each transaction with the progress bar moving to the right.
Once the donor hits a “silver” tier, send them a branded physical good through which they can show off their brand association with your Org or send them a recorded thank you from one of your Ambassadors or upgrade their donor portal login experience.
At the “gold” tier, have them talk to your mid-level giving team.

—> Side point: Progress bars for the win. If you haven’t run a/b tests with them - do.

Cadence 2: Win back lapsed donors, or “We Miss You” cadence

Duolingo is a great example here. Anybody who has tried learning another language with them has probably experienced their uncomfortably direct, anxiety inducing push notifications or ads, crafted as such to make users feel guilty for skipping their lessons.

Most Orgs wouldn’t be able to pull that off, thankfully – but the best part of Duolingo’s ads isn’t the language. It’s the “let’s ease the load” message. If you were on a streak of learning 20 words a day for a few weeks but skipped the last three days – it suggests you come back and try with just 15 words a day.

What’s the lesson?

Define “lapsed” donors not as everybody who didn’t donate for the last 3, 6, 12, or another arbitrary number of months but as somebody who broke their personal, habitual cadence.
- If the donor was donating every four months, they should be considered “lapsed” after five months of inactivity.
- For the one-time donors, define “lapsed” as thirteen months without donations
For every lapsed donor, send them an email and an automated reactivation ad campaign on display / paid social with the “it’s tough out there” message. Recognize their past support and offer to make a donation that’s 15% lower than their previous one.

Cadence 3: Donor-Generated Content to Drive Earned Media

(for Org’s with offline events or heavy volunteer engagement)

GoPro consistently invites every customer to share their videos on TikTok or Instagram, launching a viral loop – and free - cycle of driving more people of similar demographics to become new customers.

The best part? Younger audiences lap this approach up – demographics that most Org’s struggle to attract more of, so some virality and free media can go a long way.

What are the lessons?

Meet audiences where they’re at. Email falls flat and lands in the promotions tab of a Gmail app with a big button to unsubscribe - avoid that from the get-go.

If I’m hosting an event for midlevel donors in Austin (Texas) who are in that 26-40 year old bracket I know I already have access to them via Whatsapp in a Midlevel Group. Same goes for volunteers. They’re used to me sending them nuggets of relevant, interesting multimedia content. Leverage this.

Send an automated Whatsapp message to the group 14-21 days in advance. In my experience Whatsapp does groups and therefore community better than SMS. (It’s also a very helpful channel during any emergency/disaster relief for comms and fundraising).
Test sharing an Instagram post vs. TikTok and compare engagement. Publish a summary reel from the previous event instead of a generic post, and ask donors to subscribe in advance.
Depending on event goals I’ve accompanied promotions like this with a low-budget paid ads campaign to the look-a-like of registered donors to drive attendance.
I’m playing with Luma Labs at the moment (AI model that makes stunning videos from text input) so I’d tap this platform to help me create any motion graphics to communicate vibe and FOMO.
In a registration form for the event, add a field to collect volunteers’ Instagram and TikTok handles – fold them into your comms effort.
Depending on how your event is set out, use something like SmartPush to geo-fence the event space and send pop-up push notifications to all the attendees. The CTA should prompt them to record a short Reel or TikTok video and share it with their followers.

About 5-7 days after the event, post a “summary reel” from the event tagging the attendees and send them another WhatsApp message - this time accompanied by an email - with a CTA to add it to their feed and “share the experience” with their friends next time.

The above 3 cadences are simple to set up – every marketing automation tool can handle them. They don’t need to be complex – they just need to work. And they wouldn’t be so widely used in the for-profit world if they didn’t. I’m into investing my time in value creation not re-inventing the wheel!

That’s all for today!

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Now onto the interesting stuff!