What Is Your Brand?
When I say “brand,” what do you think of? Your colors, logo, font, use of images? Your style guide (hopefully your association has one)? Nope. Those things are your brand IMAGE, but they aren’t your...
View ArticleShe Tells Two Friends…And They Tell Two Friends…
Remember that old Faberge shampoo commercial, where the hook was that the shampoo was SO amazing that a woman told two friends about it, and then they each told two friends, etc., until the screen was...
View ArticleDo Your Incentives Make Sense?
I was recently chatting with a newly hired membership director. Their association offers both individual and group membership, and they were looking for ideas on ways to increase individual recruitment...
View ArticleWhat Are Your Loss Leaders?
A few years ago (pre-pandemic), I had the chance to attend an invite-only business book launch event with a room full of (other than me) pretty high-level people. Puzzlingly, the author, rather than...
View ArticleBeing Responsible About Research
In this final post celebrating the launch of Caveat Emptor: Becoming a Responsible Consumer of Research, I want to talk about why this matters. Why do association execs need to develop discernment...
View ArticleCuriosity with a Purpose
As Zora Neale Hurston described it: Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose. When you’re sponsoring a research study, one of the biggest decisions you’ll have to make...
View Article“P-Value”? What’s a “P-Value”?
And why should you care? Associations generate a lot of original research, but association execs also use a lot of research created by other entities both to assess the internal operations of the...
View ArticleLies, Damn Lies & Statistics?
Association execs consume – and produce – a lot of research in our day-to-day work, but most of us don’t have formal training in research. A lot of the language of research programs– p-values and...
View Article5: 10 Tips for Creating an Effective Marketing Piece
We’re at the midpoint of the Top 10 All-Time Spark blog posts, with #5: 10 Tips for Creating an Effective Marketing Piece. The original piece was written in response to a conference presentation I’ve...
View Article6: Explaining Marketing to a Kid
Coming in at number 6 in the all-time list of top ten Spark blog posts: Explaining Marketing to a Kid. The original post was inspired by a fun activity the association I was working for at the time...
View ArticleThe Ask Matters
About two weeks ago, DC’s mayor, Muriel Bowser, held a series of virtual budget engagement forums to share her draft budget for FY2022. The format her team chose was extremely clever. While waiting...
View ArticlePartnership v. Membership: Untangling the Knot
I’m excited to announce a new blog series I’ll be writing with Lewis Flax, the founder of Flax Associates, a consulting firm that helps nonprofits support their objectives through establishing mutually...
View ArticleGrowth Strategies from Top Fundraisers Q&A
In my last post, I shared the link to the webinar my Steal Like a Fundraiserco-author Sohini Baliga and I presented for Wild Apricot on March 21. Sohini and I got to as many questions as we could at...
View ArticleGrowth Strategies from Top Fundraisers
My Steal Like a Fundraiser: Innovations in Cause-Oriented Fundraising for Associationsco-author Sohini Baliga and I recently had the opportunity to talk with some smart people about the information in...
View ArticleWebinar: Growth Strategies from Top Fundraisers
Have you ever wondered how some charitable organizations get major donors to write those five-figure checks? Or, how they manage to attract all those millennials to volunteer? Or, how they put...
View ArticleGrowth Strategies from Top Fundraisers Q&A
In my last post, I shared the link to the webinar my Steal Like a Fundraiser co-author Sohini Baliga and I presented for Wild Apricot on March 21. Sohini and I got to as many questions as we could at...
View ArticleGrowth Strategies from Top Fundraisers
My Steal Like a Fundraiser: Innovations in Cause-Oriented Fundraising for Associations co-author Sohini Baliga and I recently had the opportunity to talk with some smart people about the information in...
View ArticleWebinar: Growth Strategies from Top Fundraisers
Have you ever wondered how some charitable organizations get major donors to write those five-figure checks? Or, how they manage to attract all those millennials to volunteer? Or, how they put...
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Don’t Get Lazy!
Putting it all together, maybe the most important thing Sohini and I learned from fundraisers as we were researching Steal Like a Fundraiser (and as Sohini has worked with them over the past two...
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Reduce Barriers to Entry
Just about every association I know of is struggling to recruit younger members (aka Millennials). Part of the reason for that is that we’re erecting barriers to entry rather than removing them. What’s...
View Article![Cloonee, Yandel & ATLAC – Movimiento – Single [iTunes Plus M4A]](http://i.imgur.com/Q8tO40p.jpeg)
