Category Archives: Planned Giving

Nonprofit Radio for January 15, 2016: Tips From Maria II

Big Nonprofit Ideas for the Other 95%

I love our sponsor!

Do you want to find more prospects & raise more money? Pursuant is a full-service fundraising agency, leveraging data & technology.

Sign-up for show alerts!

Listen Live or Archive:

My Guest:

Maria Semple: Tips From Maria II

Maria Semple

Maria Semple is our prospect research contributor, The Prospect Finder, and has a new book: “Magnify Your Business.” She shares more wisdom for your nonprofit, continuing our conversation from December 18th.

 

 


Top Trends. Sound Advice. Lively Conversation.

You’re on the air and on target as I delve into the big issues facing your nonprofit—and your career.

If you have big dreams but an average budget, tune in to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.

I interview the best in the business on every topic from board relations, fundraising, social media and compliance, to technology, accounting, volunteer management, finance, marketing and beyond. Always with you in mind.

Sign-up for show alerts!

Sponsored by:


View Full Transcript

Transcript for 272_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20160115.mp3

Processed on: 2018-11-11T23:27:19.790Z
S3 bucket containing transcription results: transcript.results
Link to bucket: s3.console.aws.amazon.com/s3/buckets/transcript.results
Path to JSON: 2016…01…272_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20160115.mp3.130229619.json
Path to text: transcripts/2016/01/272_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20160115.txt

Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host. Oh, i’m glad you’re with me. I’d bear the pain of sphincter al gia if you kicked my butt with the idea that you missed today’s show tips from maria too re a simple is our prospect research contributor the prospect find her and she has a new book magnify your business. She shares her wisdom again for your non-profit continuing our conversation from december eighteenth on tony’s take two thank you, responsive by pursuing full service fund-raising data driven and technology enabled, you’ll raise more money pursuant dot com so glad maria simple in the studio again she’s the prospect find her she’s a trainer and speaker on prospect research. Her website is the prospect finder dot com, and her new book is magnify your business tips, tools and strategies for growing your business or your non-profit she’s, our doi and of their cheap and free you’ll find her on twitter at maria simple maria so glad you in the studio again. I am so glad to be here again. Thank you. Oh my pleasure um, we’re continuing our conversation from that december eighteen show about your book, we weii wrapped up that last conversation with in person networking conversation. So let’s, go back online now and talk some about email, email not dead, right email is not dead, not dead. Absolutely it actually has a ah hyre r o i return on investment than ah then social media does it’s it’s the highest r o i and part of the reason for that, tony, is that social media, as wonderful as it is and i love social media, it requires the user right to actually be sitting in front of their computer or in front of their that requires for them tio or even their mobile phone to go to those social sites right to get your interesting information. So so even about your show, right? So you get information out about your show through email and through through ah facebook and social soder you’re right, but if i’m not in front of, if i haven’t checked into to facebook or twitter and that was the only way i was relying on getting news about your show than i might miss something important information you have. The app open right? Exactly, so but email we’re all checking email throughout the day, and, you know, as much email is we all get it’s still the best way, because now you’re you’re pushing your information directly into somebody’s in box, they may or may not read it, but at least you’re still showing up there consistently, and people are not going to opt out, you know, even if if they’re if they’re not going to be around for a week and not be able to hear your show or something, they may not open the e mail to get the details aboutthe show, but nevertheless that doesn’t mean they’re going to opt out because they still want to get info about the show. What the same thing about for non-profits right? So you want to have that that ability to stay engaged with people, um and it’s a great way to tell your stories and then to become a better story teller and i know you’ve had a number of guests on that talk about storytelling in the importance, and that is just such a fantastic way throughout the year to stay engaged with people so many times. Donorsearch eh, you know, the only time we ever hear from that organization is when they’re asking for money, you know? Well, why not take those stories and start giving them a story a month about what has happened or a success in the organization? People will you know what they want to continue funding something that’s successful people want t see yu stay successful, nobody wants to fund a sinking ship, right? So, um, so great great way to use it, it’s tio, to use e mail to do that, okay? And people are ah, as long as you’re respecting what they’ve given you permission to send there’s another reason they’re not going to opt out is because they did give you that e mail and we talked in december about having ah box, where people making it very accessible for people to give you their email address once have given it to you as long as you’re respecting their permissions, right? That they gave you write the likely to them opting out is very, very smart, and i think if you’re not overly communicating to people, one thing sometimes i see non-profits do, unfortunately is they want to. Cram all this information and i have so much to say, and so the email ends up becoming super super long. So does anybody really read a very long abila probably not know, right? So you have to be able to take and maybe maybe you need to send out two a month, you know, one more focused on events that have been happening, another one focused on a success story, you know? So you have to think about that communications strategy, um and, you know, be really clear about it, but yeah, it’s about permission based marketing. This is about people who have explicitly opted into your list because they’ve given you their email address in some way, shape or form. Or maybe they’ve attended a gn event that you’ve done or a volunteer training or something like that. So because you’ve had that we’ll call it business exchange, you are able to then add their name to your database. Oh, you think you think it’s okay to do without explicitly asking if if they’re attending? Yeah. So if they’re if they’re attending an event, um, one of your events? Yeah, if you’re okay, right? Right. So if you have a bunch of people attending one of the year non-profit events on then? Certainly. You know they can. They can be put into the database. Okay, okay. Yeah, i have. Ah, i have a friend is a guy i know. Personally, he does two things. He imports olive oil from italy, and he also is ah, singer and i opted into his olive oil list because i had bought. And i bought olive oil for myself and friends and my family around christmas time. And then he got to the point where he was in some music competition, you know, online competition, vote for the winner. You know, vote get the most number of votes and he’s going to get i forget what the prize was. Um, but he got he got carried away with using the olive oil list to promote the vote online. And it was coming down too. Every four hours, i think. Wow, because you could vote that often. Well, he had these auto emails coming to the olive oil list for the for the songs for the music competition, and people told me that they that they opted out of a unsubscribes themselves and some of them were clients, two of them were clients. Why given the olive oil to as a gift around the holidays? And they signed up for his list because they had his olive oil, and they unsubscribes when he crossed over from olive oil, the music that they didn’t give him permission, right email about music now it’s perfectly fine for him to have one email service provider company, but segment those lives, of course, just segment them that’s it, i mean, and that’s the beauty of using a service that allows you to do that level of segmentation, you know? And then, you know, even when the person went to hit the opt out if he if they had, if he had it, perhaps at least then given the option to say, you know, if you know, why are you leaving us? Would you like to receive less email? Click here for the lists you’re interested in staying connected to then your friends might have stayed and said, i only want theo, but he didn’t have that sophisticated didn’t have the separate lifts, right? Yeah, now he was aggregating and that was a mistake and those were just the people who told me so right? Yeah, you’ve got it here too. Like you said, there are rules. It’s a kansas family way won’t even talk about the law yet we’ll get there. Let’s go there right now. But we were just talking about what individual people give you. Permission, teo teo to send them email about right? Let’s, go out a little early for a break. When we come back, we’ll talk about the laws can spam, etcetera around emails stay with us you’re tuned to non-profit radio tony martignetti also hosts a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy fund-raising fundamentals is a quick ten minute burst of fund-raising insights published once a month. Tony’s guests are expert in crowdfunding, mobile giving event fund-raising direct mail and donor cultivation. Really all the fund-raising issues that make you wonder am i doing this right? Is there a better way there is? Find the fund-raising fundamentals archive it. Tony martignetti dot com that’s marketmesuite n e t t i remember there’s a g before the end, thousands of listeners have subscribed on itunes. You can also learn maura the chronicle website philanthropy dot com fund-raising fundamentals the better way durney welcome back to big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Maria let’s, let’s move to the legal legal side with his can spam act what we need to know about yeah, so i mean, google it, you get all the information you want, but i’ll give you some of the basic highlights of what you have to have in place to be known as a permission based email marketer. One of the things is you have to have that one click opt out opportunity that that’s safe unsubscribes button has to be clearly accessible to people it’s, usually at the bottom of every e mail. Also at the bottom of every e mail, you have to have your physical address where the company is based, so that has to accompany all of your e mail marketing. You have to have a clear, concise subject line and not not be a misleading subject line. There’s certain things that’ll kind of get you routed to a spam box if you put them in the subject line of there’s there’s a lot of conversation now around the word free free always used to get you into ah spam box, but i’ve talked to some people who have been doing email marketing that say they are using the word free like you no, come to my free seminar or whatever, and they are putting it in there and it is getting too in boxes, so i don’t know, maybe the maybe more sophisticated, some yeah, something’s happening, okay, but basically look at your own spam boxes and whatever words you’re seeing being used in those subject lines. Just stay away from using all of those on and there’s lots of articles that you can find online as well. You know how to structure, subject, line and so forth, so can’t be misleading. So they’re a couple of other things, and actually for any of our listeners who are in canada or marketing to people in canada, there laws are even more strict than the laws in the united states. S o you want to stay compliant with what is called castle csl? Think it’s called canadian anti spam legislation are even more strict than the u s laws are. So especially if any we have any listeners who are, you know, bordering the canadian ah yeah, the and you, you might have. Some, some, some donors or people that are you know, you’re communicating to make sure that you are staying compliant with castle. Okay, now we can give a shout out to a constant contact. You do you do work with them, right? You’re a certified guru, you know, grand, high exalted mystic ruler with with that’s the honeymooners reference with the constant contact. Yeah, i’m one of their authorized local experts. So i do go around and do a lot of talks around email marketing, best practices, you know, things to do not to do to get yourself in trouble. Um, so yeah, i really enjoyed that i enjoy my affiliation with them very much, and i’m also one of their master certified solution providers. So i help my clients actually implement those strategies. Go that’s what i saw maybe think of grand high exalted mystic ruler master service stressed mannion master certified as a certified party metoo downgrade us strategic command. Whatever i said, ok don’t even listen to myself. I don’t know what i’m saying. I don’t pay attention. I don’t know why others do you gotta do okay, so since you’re mss p m c s p q. R s you got any advice around a subject line? Testing? You know, how do we get the best subject lines? So you want to think about keeping your subject lines pretty short? About five to eight words. Ah, most pete, a lot of people around it’s hovering around the sixty percent mark right now, people are opening their emails or looking at e mails on mobile devices. So it’s super important to test your your email. Make sure you preview send it to yourself. Look at it on the computer. Look at it on your mobile device. I have a colleague who has a different mobile device. Take a look at it as well. Um, so about five to eight, words is good. The most important words should be upfront. So if the ah, you know, the meet of what you’re trying to say is like, you know, the eighth word out, people are really there. We call it the to the rule of the two two to rule. Right? You two seconds to get somebody’s attention. The first two words matter most. And you have to be able to demonstrate to them why it’s important today that they opened that email. Okay. Yeah, i see. I see valuable oppcoll real estate in that subject line. Wasted sometimes when the now i didn’t know that too. You know, first two words of support, but the wasted something like announcing my war here is my you know, no kidding. I mean, you know, it’s, cut that out. You know, it’s, just use this if it’s free, you know grayce seminar next week don’t say announcing my seminar next week, which is free, right? And then there’s an area underneath the subject line known as pre header text, which typically on lee shows up a mobile devices. So that that’s pretty cool. That’s? Um, extra real estate? Yeah, the pre header. Yeah. You see that? And some people don’t use that. You’ll see. It’ll say just something perfunctory. Like to view this best to view this online in better form matter. Something whatever you like here. Yeah, but how do you get to that pre formatted? How’d you get to that? Protect so in email service providers like constant contact it’s actually in the header options it’s underneath the subject line, you can actually put another line. Think of it. As a subject line, point to point oh, yeah, right. Ok, so, it’s gonna depend on what provider you’re using, right? You want to look for that real estate? Yeah, you want to look for that really stayed in your head or options so that you can actually put it in there. And and as i said, it’s, mostly just viewable on mobile devices, but it is going to give you that option, that opportunity, because in a mobile device, you’re going to see the from line. So who it’s from the next line is the subject line in the third line is is valuable real estate now, too. So you want to think, you know, you know, how do we want to appear in a new in box? Because people who are there in boxes are so incredibly crowded and you’re competing against everybody else trying to get their attention especially, you know, around, you know, holiday time or giving tuesday time. So, you know, think now you know, this is january think now to win, you’re going to be running you’re giving tuesday campaign in november, start thinking about interesting subject lines that you’re going to use leading up to giving tuesday. How can you tweak that subject line? How can you tweak that pre header text to build some excitement leading up to giving tuesday? You’ve got plenty of time, no excuses. That’s. True. Yes, eleven months. Okay. No, no. Cool. Alright, that’s. Yeah, the subject line. Very interesting to me. Um, yeah, now we i think this is sort of subsumed in what we’re just saying, but you know why? Outlook is not the best. Teo, just be sending mass e mails from, you know, because all these features which you don’t get all the features, first and foremost, you’re not staying compliant with the can spam law, right? So when you’re sending out so you don’t footer the unsubscribes none of that is there, and then what what you’re doing is if you’re sending it out through your outlook account, typically you’re only sending it out and what batches of fifty or maybe a hundred is not going to allow bigger batches, right? Exactly. But what’s happening is even if from let’s say, i send une email out and i’m sending it in batches of fifty i might send it to myself. You have to maria at the prospect finder dot com and put everybody else as blind copy, right? So you think, okay, i’m you know i’m good because i’m not showing everybody’s email address and so that everything’s cool, but it’s not because the computers receiving those emails can detect that there are fifty other blind copies attached to this and the computer’s receiving them, right? Theis peas receiving them. Say, well, wait a minute, hold on a minute. This looks like it could be spam. I’m not going to put this e mail in your inbox. Tony, i’m going to take this email and i’m gonna put it in your spam folder because they can see that it’s attempted the bcc. Yes, he could be hurting yourself. So yeah. So you’re thinking your emails are getting through to somebody’s in box and there’s a pretty good chance that that’s been routed to somebody. Spam. I don’t know. I don’t know about you, but i never check it. Yeah, rarely. And i’m scanning it. You know, there’s hundreds there. I’m looking, you know, probably the first dozen or something. I remember the dark days of non-profit radio five and a half years ago. When i was doing the email blast, and even before that, when i when i had my own, when i was doing email newsletters and i would send them out in batches of sometimes one hundred or ninety eight worked. But then yahoo was the back end, then they would change their algorithm, so ninety eight wouldn’t work. I have to go to, like forty seven or something forty nine and i’d be doing that like twenty times to get the thousand round. How long duvette state are? Oh my god, it was ridiculous! Yeah, i took it an hour, but then you also had no idea who received it. You don’t know that none of the three analytics air gone you don’t you don’t you don’t know who received it. Who opened it? Who clicked? Where was their interests? Right? You know what? What were they interested in in reading about rates? Not well. Click to your website. That’s that’s. Super important have none of that much more sophisticated and well let’s not get carried away. I’ve gotten better. We’ll put it that way. But now i know i use use male chimp for for the for the weekly email alerts for the show, right? So, i mean, you have to use something you have to use some sort of a system that’s going to give you those back and athletics and keep you compliant with all the laws. I mean, you and i, we don’t want to be known a spammers. I’m sure all your listeners in the non-profit arena, they don’t want to be known as a spammer. No, of course. Right, right. Let’s, you have some tips about, like, finding the best email service provider. We talked about that. Well, i mean so it depending on what your you know what you can afford to do and not dio it really will depend. So for some organizations who don’t have ah ah, high level of sophistication and how to use email marketing. It’s super important that they have somebody to call, right? So male chip, for example, of my understanding is there’s. A email is the way way to go about rittereiser carpet for me, but right, right, so that you know so they live chat to write. Okay. So live chat where’s with constant contact there’s an eight hundred number to call. So you get a live person bragging about? No, no, but you know what i’m saying, but it’s, no milk for some people’s chimp it’s a chip don’t don’t beat up on the trip, but for some pizza. Dora borton, it’s tohave the phone service for right, right? Yeah, depending on you know how, how sophisticated you know how much experience you have? We’ll go with using these so so customer support, whatever that is. So just explore customer support options because that might be important to you. So understanding, you know, are you paying by the number of emails that you park in the system? Are you paying by the number of emails you’re sending on a monthly basis so there are there are fees based on, you know, how how often you’re using the system in some cases? Okay, um, you want teo, you wantto make sure you have all those back end analytics and the other thing that that you want to make sure that you can do is take your emails and integrate them with your social media. Good let’s go there, okay, so super important that that you’d be able to do that so so as an example. When i send out my newsletter on my monthly newsletter or where i’m going to be speaking, or whatever that simultaneously, when i set up and schedule for that email to go out it let’s, say, ten a m tomorrow, it will simultaneously post it to my twitter, my facebook and my linked in accounts so that right opposite the post what is a post that act? A link to that newsletter? Okay, so so now people who are not even subscribed to that database to my email newsletter are going to be seeing it because they might be following me on one of those other social media channels, so they still get access to the newsletter, you know, with all the branding. Oh, so your newsletter is sitting somewhere on your site. So the newsletter every newsletter that you send out is an actual girl? Not sure. Funeral no ideo for so yes. So it’s a girl. So it’s basically it’s that earl is what’s getting shared amongst all those social sites. So you want to be able to do that and it’s a huge time saver to be able to simultaneously set up that send to have it. All done. Send post done. You know, it’s it’s just it’s out there for you. And are you able to format what is posted on the social sites simultaneously is not just a canned correct here’s maria’s latest newsletter, right? So you would so you know, your your voice in twitter might be a little different than your ass in the other social networks. I’m also the photo that you decide to attach with that post because photos we know get ah hyre engagement on social media. So you do want to select some sort of a photo that captures the essence of that post? Eso you draw that right out of your in my case, i dropped right out of my constant contact photo library and i posted at the same time. Okay. Okay. Excellent. Um, emails. Good. So it’s important. So anything else you want to say about email before we we pursue something else? I know what you know. I think that you know, just as long as people are doing it and my my maquis message around it is it’s not dead because it’s still the hardiest r a y for for your money is right. In the inbox. So right in the box. Okay, all right, now you have a chapter that is devoted to what your primary work is. Prospecting expanding your your networks on dh you’re our diet of dirt cheap and free you even if we’ve talked about some of these in the past, hasn’t been recent so let’s, let’s share some some local resource is right. So you know what a fan i am of local library libraries, and so i definitely want to bring that to everybody’s. Attention again, thie still might. One of my favorite databases in the local library is reference yusa. So if you’re looking to prospect for lists of specific industries also they have a database around. Ah, homeowners database. So if you’re looking for new homeowners or people who live in houses of valued above five hundred thousand dollars, you know, whatever it is. So i would really recommend that you go to your local library, talkto a reference library in about reference, use a specifically and how you can use it. I mean, i use it off site. I use it by my using my library card. The bar code on the card? Yes. This is something we’ve talked about, but not recently in a while, but now you’re a couple of years having that library card. Yeah, i don’t i don’t even step foot into the library to use the databases. It’s fantastic, you know, on dh then even when there is a there might be something that i’m having trouble researching, and i can’t seem to find the answer to it. A lot of libraries will have available free chat with a reference librarian. Really? Yeah. Yeah, i know you can do that with the new york public library system, for example. Um, and in new jersey, we used to have a twenty four seven until there were pounds of budget cuts and then that that went away twenty four seven. But local libraries have tried to maintain it, you know, during working hours is closed. Can this is new jersey to imagine what the rest of the country is doing. How much more sophisticated i grew up in new jersey. That’s why that’s? Why? I’m comfortable saying that i don’t live there now, but i grew up in old japan. New jersey. I’m bona fide. No. Okay, good. Very good to know? Yeah, the local library card. So how do you do you have an i d number is just it’s a barcode that you know, the number underneath the bar code that’s what gets you in? And it’ll ask you before you actually try and use the reference yusa from your desktop at home. It’ll actually ask you to input your library card number. Okay, so, you know it’s fantastic. So that that that is really good resource. I know. A few years ago, my my local united way, we were looking to connect with more women business owners in our county because of ah, local women’s fund-raising event we were doing so actually used reference yusa and mind it simply for our county. Um, and then you khun you, khun select by gender for the top executives. So i selected female and, you know, came up with a list invited all these people to the event through ah, a mailer that sent out and, you know, it did result in one or two new sponsorships actually for for the event. So, you know, as and i was doing that as a volunteer for the organization. But this is something really easy that that any non-profit organization can assign to even a high school student to be able to do for them. What other resource is might we find in our public library that we could ask about? They will often be able to tell you about local business resource is like business publications that are really geared toward your state. So if you’re you know you’re looking to connect with, you know, some certain associations, they’re speaking of associations, they have a publication called the encyclopedia of associations, which is not online, it is online as well. In some libraries, my mind doesn’t have it available online, but in case your library doesn’t know that there is a hard copy format to this encyclopedia. I mean, just for the general public, you can’t there’s no there’s, no encyclopedia of associations online, that’s free. No, i think you have to go through a library portal. I’m pretty sure i mean, the book exists, but i i’ve never tried accessing it to through, you know, going to any website other than accessing it through library. What a fan you are of public library. Huge. You go there for, um what about? Is that a lexisnexis? When you find that it, like public libraries, typically not for free? Well, if they’re going to have it, they’re going to probably require you to go on site to use it because it is a very expensive database. Okay, so something some libraries might have it, but you have to go there in person to use it. Okay, um, let’s. See what else you got. Anything else local? We got just about a minute or so before break any other local free dirt cheap. Well, i mean, you know, my one of my favorites too mine. Islington. So what we we probably want to dedicate a little more time to that again. But you definitely you know, it’s, the only social media network that khun b mind you, khun set up those advanced searches. Once that searches set, you can have linked and just continually return those search results. Okay, why don’t we take our break? And when we come back, we’ll talk more about how underutilized maria thinks linked in is stay with us. And ah, tony martignetti is making mistake. I thought it was a it was a later break where you don’t go anywhere you are. You had to stay with us because i have to talk about pursuing and how grateful i am that they renewed their sponsorship. I love it. Thank you so much for doing that. And really, just for that, i would ask you to check them out if you need to raise more money just because they’re loyal toe non-profit radio. They have tools that make your fund-raising more efficient, better managed. They have a tool velocity that will help you find new potential donors and the existing donors who are ripe for for upgrade. S o if somebody’s giving you, you know, a thousand dollars a year, they can give you five thousand velocity can help you find them. If there’s giving five thousand, maybe, you know, twenty, five hundred, they could be giving ten thousand velocity one of the pursuant fund-raising tools pursuing dot com. You’ll raise more money now. It’s time for tony’s take two. I want to say thank you. So here it is. Thank you whether you’re listening live podcast or affiliate. Whether you get the weekly show alerts their email here, they’re just called maria email here’s here’s email talking with me about maria and you know how valuable email is as a tool, i have weekly alerts they go out every thursday tell you who the guest star if you’re getting those in your inbox, thank you so much. If you’re subscribed on youtube or you with me on twitter, i thank you. Um, connected on linkedin, thank you very much. Facebook fan. Thank you. I thank you if it’s none of those i don’t know what the hell’s wrong because there’s so many ways to connect with me, you ought to be taking advantage of one of them, so i would say, you know, if you’re not, you’re cheating yourself. Really? I mean, yeah, you know, it’s your life. Go ahead, it’s your career if you want to put it at risk by not being well informed through non-profit radio, uh, you know, you’re going to suffer the consequences. Oh, i can do is make it available to you to quote alec baldwin in glengarry glen ross. I have no sympathy for you. That’s tony, stick to take it. Or leave it. Okay, maria simple. Now we can continue talking about linked in which you this is what this is. What first length you to me years ago, it was at the westchester county a f p and you were on a panel with a few of our friends, the wrist angle and mars and mark halpert talking about how underutilized linkedin is. And you were so good in it that i not long after invited you to be a contributor on non-profit radio so linked in brought us together. Do you still think it’s underutilized? This was, like, forty years ago or so five years ago? Yeah, i mean, believe it or not, i still go around and i do talks, and i still have people raising their hands saying, yeah, kind of there. I don’t know what i’m supposed to do one i mean, i’m there people look at yeah, they still do they still look, er, you know, and so you know, non-profits you have to realize that lincoln actually has resource is set aside for for your sector, and so if you go to non-profits dot linked in dot com, you’ll actually see the slough. Of resource is that a for-profit like tony or i would have to pay for? Yes and a non-profit can have it for free, you know they have the board connect. So if you’re looking to augment your board this year twenty sixteen it’s, a tool made for meeting boardmember it is a tour for meeting for board members, right? And people will indicate that they are looking for boardmember ship opportunities so you can use that that database to prospect for those people who have raised their hand and said, hey, i’m interested. Where do you find board? You’ll find board elected non-profit dot lengthen dot com yes, non-profits i think non-profit but you have to have a non-profit account in order to use it, right? Well, they so yeah, few. So if you work for a nonprofit organization, you should be able teo and all. You know, all this. The steps and procedures on getting tied in with that is it’s all you know, very clearly outlined there for you at that non-profit darlington. Yeah. Ok. Right. So that be sort of your your your starting point portal for all this rain information? Eso you know that it’s? Something that’s underutilized and i think that non-profits could take advantage of that. We’re looking for volunteer opportunities. You khun post those as well. So there’s a volunteer we were talking on the last show about volunteer matching so you can you khun use that for that? If you have job positions that you want to post, you can use that they’re so there’s really a lot more that that non-profits could be doing work with lengthen even as a prospect research tool oh my god. Somebody’s coming to your event if you want to know more about them before they come or afterwards billions i know you’re a big fan of pre event. Yeah, research. We had a show on that back in november, i think or early december prion post event research, right. But but just as a prospect research tool having nothing to do with events, right? Exactly. So when i’m sitting down doing prospect research every time i’m given a name to research, that is definitely one of the places i look. Well, actually, even when i googled the person’s name if they have a profile on linkedin it’s coming up on page one of clinton’s of google search results eso it’s you know, inevitably i am going to end up whether i go directly or google pushes me there. I’m goingto linked in to find information on somebody, and you’re getting insider tips. I mean, maria is a prospect researcher her cos the prospect finder for god’s sake, you know, you’re getting insider tips, you know, like i said, it’s, your life if you’re not paying attention to this, i have no sympathy for you. I don’t know what else to say. All right? What? What else linked in what else could we be doing? So i think that, you know, one of the other things that you want to think about doing is leveraging your own internal databases are sounds. Warren. What does that mean? So? So think about again going back to what we talked about on the last show. Your your tribe, right. Your board, other people who are close to your organization, you know, how can you use that? To be able to, to magnify and grow, you know? What are you doing? What type? You know what? Types of cultivation events, what types of gala event? You know what are you doing to engage a larger community on dh then also, what are you doing in the online world to engage and and build your tribe as well? And some of those online ambassadors again, you know, i hate to keep bringing in giving tuesday, but it was very popular in twenty fifteen it’s surpassed the prior year. I would think that this is only going to continue to grow, just like we’re seeing online shopping grow during the holidays. You have to be thinking now, what is your strategy going to be around giving tuesday? You know what? What should we be doing? Maybe there are some online ambassadors in the linked in space that we should be looking to recruit. You could bring it on to our tribe was looking for you circles back to lincoln and i was getting impatient e was giving you time try not to jump on you where you’re digressing only i’m allowed to digress. I created aggression, alright, you licked it back to lincoln that, yes, so you find people who have a lot of juice on lengthen or who are close to you or you’d like to be closer to write. Right? And maybe there are people who are, i think, what do they call it? Self professed lions al i o n s i don’t know. What is that? I think it linked in open networker s o thes air people who have, i don’t know thousands and i don’t know they they’re self professed lions on lincoln s so if you’re connected to them, then you’re only two degrees separated from whole slew people. Ok. Eso if you could get a lion to be their designating themselves on the lion yeah. What? You just put that in your sometimes so far line? Yeah, i see it in their headlines quite often. Lion? Yeah. Lengthen. What is it? Open networker. Well, well, everybody’s alive, but that’s, what link, then is open networking. Yeah, but some people are, you know, a little bit. I mean, it depends on how people use linked in. And some people are a little bit more guarded with how many people that they let you know let in but linked in open networkers lions, they just don’t connect with anybody anywhere around the world there. Horse linked in horse murcott maria’s left the way i do. It with anybody that means is that what that is? Well, but i mean, maybe maybe that is red or maybe that’s what you wanted to call them till this is ready? Your shirt? I don’t. All right, watch out for the lions. I don’t know. Yeah, yeah. Personally, i don’t like connecting tow lions. Yeah, because i mean there’s no connect. I mean, i’m pretty liberal about who? All who. I’ll connect with her, but yeah, i mean it’s, not just anybody. I have some standards. My wife may be listening. I mean, i have some standards. All right? All right. Goodness. Is that the show’s going? Dariel really go. I think this is xena’s trajectory. This is the scene. If we’re talking about downhill were at the scene with the apogee jutze went to the appetite of the zenith. Alright. Yours red is your shirt. All right? Let’s, move on. Wade beat up lincoln and told people multiple times you’ve got to be doing more with yeah, absolutely. You have to leverage it. Okay. Okay. Um, what else were we? We were starting talking about local. You didn’t mention chamber of commerce. You did back in december, right? Chamber of commerce, you’re big, you’re big fans. Chambers of commerce. Yeah, absolutely. So you know that that’s certainly one way you can you can leverage your your local presence, you know, sit down and talk to your two. If you’re a member of the chamber certainly talk to the person who’s in charge of member services. Sometimes they have non-profit membership categories do yeah, yeah, absolutely. And they’ll have special events and so forth and talk to them about you know what you’re you know, you hope to dio and then also, you know, there might be opportunities to partner with the chamber so that, like i’ve seen in some communities where there will be, like, almost like a biz fast but it’s really just to showcase the local non profit organization. So all the vendor tables are on ly non-profits you know, in the room so that’s really a great way to showcase, you know, the local organizations, so if that doesn’t exist in your community, maybe you can help to spearhead that effort. And you know what? Go race association doesn’t exist created right? Creative organisation, gramps great. Tell the chamber you know you’re missing an opportunity. Yeah, one hundred non-profits in this in this town, right? Okay, well, i kind of did that on my own and my own chamber. I really pushed them, too, you know, creating a separate non-profit council within the chamber. And then, of course, when it came around to them saying, ok, well, somebody needs to chair that committee. You go for zoho careful what you ask for. Are you still chair? I coach eric i coach arika you brought some, but i refused to coach. I refused to take it on alone. And not because i didn’t want to do the work, but because i felt it was important that it had to be a somebody wearing a non-profit hat, right? I wear for-profit hat as a consultant. Yes. I really felt that it was important that somebody wearing a non-profit hat be seated at the table to spearhead the effort. Okay. In other words, you pulled in another sucker. Well, we looked around the table and found a rationality e i said, i’ll do it. If somebody also helped me with talk about getting through the week without a good rationalization, then go no. Now, that made a lot. Of sense. Okay, you have a chapter on technology? Yeah, what’s the problem here. So, you know, there just aren’t enough hours in the day, tony, so i needed tio for myself, i needed to find some tools. So i am, you know, inserted in my book some of those tools that i’m using that i that i find are very helpful in terms of online aps. Or or, you know, computer apse, that that will allow me to to gain back a little bit of time. One of those tools that i’ve been using that i really like is called asana have you spell it? No, i don’t know a asana and in so they have free version, sana is a yoga is not a yoga. Or is that a practice or something? Asana, no sun worship? No, your that’s a sona? No. Okay, i don’t know. I forget that way we can edit this part out. Now we don’t do post production on this show and you’re stuck. You’re stuck. Okay, asana and they would tell me about it. And so there’s. Another one also called base camp over. The one that i’m using is asana dahna is what to do? So it enables you to keep a project moving along, right? So? So you have a project you have who? The collaborators are on that project, right? And so they could be people in your office. They could be boardmember sze yu know whoever it is. And then everybody’s assigned a task. And so the beautiful thing is that asana once everybody’s been assigned to task, of course, that everybody in there has an email is associated with it. Asana will automatically send out an email saying you have a task due today for exercising project project management. Yeah. Collaborative project management. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is it free? Um, so there are i’m using it for free buy-in of dirt cheap in free. But but there are also, you know, depending on a guest enterprise level, you know how many people have to use it there have step up opportunities to what projects have you managed on asana? Eso is an example. I have. Um ah, speaking, when i do my speaking engagements, i will have my my my virtual admen who was actually from my community. But she works, you know, doesn’t work in my office. So i have her do some pre calling on dh post calling t my events just as a friendly reminder. You registered. Well, look, you know, marie is looking forward to seeing you tomorrow, so when i set up for every event that i set up, there are the repetitive tasks that happened with that event. S oh, there’s the reminder to me to send her the list of the registrants than than the reminder is sent to her automatically from the system. On what day she’s supposed to call me uncle? Okay, so it’s, you know, and then you can park documents in there too. So when i want to send her the list of people, i don’t have to do it just through email, i can upload it into the asana dashboard so that she can go there and retrieve thie spreadsheet of people who are registered for the event as an example so non-profits could use that as well, right? So you have, you know, all kinds of events and non-profits writing an event could be, i don’t know an office renovation. I mean there’s all kinds of potential project. Yeah, the annual report has to get done right. We could have one for mailings, strategic from your from your communication strategy plan, communications plan. Think about just even giving tuesday, right? Right. You know what the date is going to be and start thinking out. Okay, well, what do we need to start doing now? What do we do in february? March, april? What do we need to do monthly as we move toward giving tuesday, and then, of course, things will ramp up closer. You’re all about giving tuesday ten months early. Well, you want to think about it earlier. I agree. I agree. All right. We have a couple minutes left, and you’re you’re closing. Chapter is about your tribe. We talked about the tribe in the back in december, but feeding, keeping your tribe engaged, keeping the tribe in gates. Right. So you do need some sort of a tool, right? I mean, as a prospect researcher having that cr m customer relationship management tool in the nonprofit world, we really call it that donor a management system. It’s really vitally important to have all that information parked someplace because what we what we have to be able to do is understand you. Know how people are engaging with the non-profit on dh. There has to be that his that history, right? Because staff changes so much you need to be ableto have that history move from one staff member to critical you can’t. You can’t have somebody leave your organization, and institutional knowledge goes out the door. Yeah, well, keep this topic up. Well, let’s, let’s to go after this, our last break, and we’ll continue this conversation. Like what you’re hearing a non-profit radio tony’s got more on youtube, you’ll find clips from stand up comedy tv spots and exclusive interviews catch guests like seth gordon, craig newmark, the founder of craigslist marquis of eco enterprises, charles best from donors choose dot org’s aria finger do something that worked and they are levine from new york universities heimans center on philanthropy tony tweets to he finds the best content from the most knowledgeable, interesting people in and around non-profits to share on his stream. If you have valuable info, he wants to re tweet you during the show. You can join the conversation on twitter using hashtag non-profit radio twitter is an easy way to reach tony he’s at tony martignetti narasimhan t i g e n e t t i remember there’s a g before the end he hosts a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy fund-raising fundamentals is a short monthly show devoted to getting over your fund-raising hartals just like non-profit radio, toni talks to leading thinkers, experts and cool people with great ideas. As one fan said, tony picks their brains and i don’t have to leave my office fund-raising fundamentals was recently dubbed the most helpful non-profit podcast you have ever heard, you can also join the conversation on facebook, where you can ask questions before or after the show. The guests were there, too. Get insider show alerts by email, tony tells you who’s on each week and always includes link so that you can contact guess directly. To sign up, visit the facebook page for tony martignetti dot com. If you have big dreams in a small budget tune into tony martignetti non-profit radio, i d’oh. I’m adam braun, founder of pencils of promise. I can’t send the authentic, the bona fide, the genuine live listen love, because we are pre recorded today, but of course the love goes out. Whatever city state you’re in podcast pleasantries, same thing that over ten thousand listening on whatever device, whatever, who knows? Whatever all the things i say, whatever place, whatever you’re doing, wherever you are. Thank you. Podcast pleasantries out to the podcast listener that’s you that’s you right there listening right now and affiliate affections are many am and fm stations throughout the country affections out to those am and fm listeners. Let your local station know thatyou listen, by the way, that would be cool. I’d love to get some feedback. Um, but i know you’re out there. Affiliate affections. Okay, mohr with maria coming up here it is right now. We’re up. I don’t know why i said coming up because this is it, um, written it. We’re in it right now. You experiencing it? Live pre recorded. Okay. Keeping people engaged. I mean, this tribe engagement is just, you know, you just want to be friendly. I mean, you just wanna have conversations with people online like you do face-to-face it’s. Just keep up the relationship, right? Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. But, you know, there’s certain things that you want to think about, maybe thinking about a calendar on a weekly basis, maybe you know, you khun schedule out some of the posts used technology to tools like hoot sweet tea, post some of that stuff, but maybe monday is going to be i don’t know your motivation monday or something like that. And then maybe tuesday you’ll post about, you know, an upcoming event that you’re having in the in the way distant future. Maybe wednesday is your day to do ah, a fun fill in the blank engagement thing with your audience. So, you know, if you have those sort of general things all right, this is what we do on mondays and tuesdays and wednesday. Of course, you have to be ableto. You know, when something happens, you need to be able to react neo-sage before. But if you have that yeah. General plan. Right and engagement plan with you with your tribe. You mentioned motivation monday. Watch the use of a liberations that’s. Pretty much proprietary to me on non-profit radio. Is it watching? Well, podcast pleasantries, affiliate. Affections live. Listen, hello, haven’t you noticed, have you not noticed tony’s take to have you not noticed a pattern? How long we’ve been on this show for a half year’s motivational monday, yours no, but it’s in a liberation. Ok, so what i’m saying, cubine well, though, i heard all of the things i thought you were claiming, motivated, you know, that’s, a that’s, a that’s, a lackluster at best. All right, if we want to choose a cr em if we don’t, if we’re reevaluating now, we’ve had entire show’s on right choosing the right database. I’ve had guests on from non-profit technology conference, but, you know, it’s good to hit the highlights on dhere different voices. So your advice on choosing the right, you know, i mean, just generally, right? So you like you said you’ve had a bunch of guests on who really delve into it a lot, but, you know, just at a high level, you know, you want to think about, you know, how easy is it? Tto learn the system, right? How many times i’ve talked to a non profit organization and they’ve said, yeah, we’ve got a donor database and, you know, we’ve had a some staff turnover, and we don’t think people are really using it all that effectively and, you know, certainly our board has no idea on how to use it. And so you want to make sure you know how user friendly is it is everybody up to snuff on their training? If if you i got to spend the money to train some new people than then that’s what you have to do, but it makes no sense to have a database that that you know, it’s that whole garbage in garbage out, right? If if people aren’t using it properly, it’s it’s absolutely no use to the organization and you can’t get out of it what you need no, no, absolutely not. Also thinking about technical support, how was that handled? You know, is it email support? Is that phone support is a chat support? Is that all of the above? So just understanding, you know, once you get past the sales process and the person that you’re talking to that might be selling that system to you, what kind of support is going to exist after that? Also conversion support that’s always a big top. Yes. How is our data going to get from? Whatever were you doing now into this new system that we’re going to be spending a lot of money on? Probably, you know, so conversion support? Yes. Ok, s o you know and what’s that conversion support going to look like what? What format will it take? You know? Is somebody going to be in the office with me? Is somebody going? To be on the phone, you know how, what? What is what format is that going to take for some organizations? It’s, it’s, super important to know how customizable it is. Also, some people want to make sure that it integrates with outside systems, like if there, if they’re using an outside system to run an email marketing program, you know, do the system’s integrate so that as an example, if if somebody ops out of your email marketing list, is that opt out going to be carried through and reflected in your donordigital base, because otherwise you’re not going to be staying compliant with that can spam law that teo so you want to make sure that if you are looking at a system that it is going to be able to integrate and play, i like to say play nicely with other systems so that, um, things integrate and opt ins opt outs are all reflected across the board evenly, okay, so you know, things like that might be it might be really important. The other thing that that people talk about a lot is it cloud based, of course, and if it isyou know who has access? To it, what are the passwords? How often are you changing the passwords? Who has access to those past security? Generally, yes, oh, just security generally around that sea are m is really super important, you know, when where? Well we’re talking about, you know, prospect research, especially, and those serums and those donors, han ege mint systems, they’re going to hold the data, you know, when i do a profile for somebody for an organisation, and i deliver that profile, i’m delivering it in microsoft word format, actually, because the expectation is there going to copy and paste in or at least somehow make this as an attachment to that, that that constituent that donor prospects profile around with their record in this? Yeah, and so it’s got to be secure. I mean, yeah, i mean, the information that i’m pulling as a prospect researcher, i’m getting that in the public domain, but nevertheless, you want to be sensitive to the fact that you don’t want this information just walking out of the office and floating around it’s still personal, even if it’s public domain it’s also aggregated and lots of individual bits of publicly available data when pulled. Together in one document have a good much greater value than all their their constituent pieces floating out that you had to spend the time to find, right, exactly aggregated it has a lot could have a lot more bigger consequences if lost or compromise right than then scattered. You let you have some advice around using linked in as a starter. C r m yeah, so it could definitely be be used as a starter. Cr m one of the interesting things is, once you are first degree connected to somebody you’ll notice underneath that box that has their photo and and their headline and all that underneath that box is an area there’s a tab called, um, i think it’s like relationship or something like that so you can actually put in there some notes. You know how how i met tony? You could sort of tag them? Yeah, pre-tax probono except that well, yes, it’s certainly because these notes are searchable. Well, i’m not sure if they’re searchable, though that would be really great, maybe that’s coming down the line, but definitely i could put i could put no notations in there and it will also send me a reminder so let’s say you and i talk and then for some reason, we decide we need to talk again in a month about something so i can set up a tickler reminder within linked in and it’ll lincoln will email me a reminder that, hey, i’m supposed to talk to tony today. Oh, wow, i don’t know. Where is this? Tell tell us again. So it’s underneath, you know the box that has your photo and and all of that. And then eso underneath that there’s a tab? Where there you can fill out your your contact information and then there’s another tab where your first degree connected to somebody that’s for you personally to see. So you know. Gosh, tony, if you ever want to see what i have written up about you in my link dahna thank you. I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want alluded to obliquely. Not at all. No let’s. Move to a different subject. No. Okay, but that’s all right. So you could put notes? Yes. He coming notes contact. Exactly. Exactly. So it’s, you know, contact out of base light, if you will. But you know it’s kind. Of useful if you if you just need even a little reminder sent to you about something. Okay, we have about thirty seconds, and then this wraps up our are to show extravaganzas yes, of your of your of your book. So what do you want to leave people with? You know, i just want to leave people with with the notion that you know that in order to magnify their organizations, they just they’ve got to get themselves out there and they’ve got to get out there online, they’ve got to get out there networking, they’ve gotta have good, solid websites, um, and and they’ve got to be willing to get out there and shake hands and meet new people and really become part of the community. We got to leave it there. The book. Just just get the thing for pete’s sake. It’s on amazon, magnify your business tips, tools and strategies for growing your business or your non-profit you’ll find maria at the prospect finder dot com and also at maria simple on twitter. Of course, thanks so much for being in the studio to shows. Thank you so much for having me, tonia marchenese absolute pleasure. Next week, gerald richards on leadership development and amy sample ward returns our social media contributor. If you missed any part of today’s show finding on tony martignetti dot com, where in the world else would you go? I’m still not sure if i’m going to keep that for all of twenty sixteen, but i’m not saying we’re not. We’re sponsored by pursuant online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled. Pursuant dot com. Our creative producers, claire meyerhoff, sam liebowitz is the line producer. Gavin dollars are am and fm outreach director shows social media is by dina russell. Our music is by scott stein. Be with me next week for non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Go out and be great. What’s not to love about non-profit radio tony gets the best guests check this out from seth godin this’s the first revolution since tv nineteen fifty and henry ford nineteen twenty it’s the revolution of our lifetime here’s a smart, simple idea from craigslist founder craig newmark insights orn presentation or anything? People don’t really need the fancy stuff they need something which is simple and fast. When’s the best time to post on facebook facebook’s andrew noise nose at traffic is at an all time hyre on nine am or eight pm so that’s when you should be posting your most meaningful post here’s aria finger ceo of do something dot or ge young people are not going to be involved in social change if it’s boring and they don’t see the impact of what they’re doing so you gotta make it fun and applicable to these young people look so otherwise a fifteen and sixteen year old they have better things to do if they have xbox, they have tv, they have their cell phones me dar is the founder of idealised took two or three years for foundation staff to sort of dane toe, add an email address their card. It was like it was phone. This email thing is fired-up that’s why should i give it away? Charles best founded donors choose dot or ge somehow they’ve gotten in touch kind of off line as it were and and no two exchanges of brownies and visits and physical gift mark echo is the founder and ceo of eco enterprises. You may be wearing his hoodies and shirts. Tony talked to him. Yeah, you know, i just i’m a big believer that’s not what you make in life. It sze, you know, tell you make people feel this is public radio host majora carter. Innovation is in the power of understanding that you don’t just do it. You put money on a situation expected to hell. You put money in a situation and invested and expect it to grow and savvy advice for success from eric sabiston. What separates those who achieve from those who do not is in direct proportion to one’s ability to ask others for help. The smartest experts and leading thinkers air on tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent.

15NTC Videos: Community & The Commons

Here’s the next set of video interviews from 15NTC, the 2015 Nonprofit Technology Conference, hosted by Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN). These Nonprofit Radio interviews are about your online community and Creative Commons. I encourage you to check out 16NTC. I’ll see you there!

Your Online Community with Megan Keane, Michael Wilson & Joe Prosperi

Creative Commons with Carly Leinheiser & Craig Sinclair

Nonprofit Radio for January 8, 2016: Don’t Burn Out in 2016 & The PATH for Charities

Big Nonprofit Ideas for the Other 95%

I love our sponsor!

Do you want to find more prospects & raise more money? Pursuant is a full-service fundraising agency, leveraging data & technology.

Sign-up for show alerts!

Listen Live or Archive:

My Guests:

Paul Loeb: Don’t Burn Out in 2016

Paul Loeb

Paul Loeb has been doing social change since the Vietnam War and his most recent books are “Soul Of a Citizen” and “The Impossible Will Take a Little While.” After nearly 50 years of activisim, he has a lot to recommend about keeping yourself motivated day-after-day. We talked at Opportunity Collaboration 2015 in Ixtapa, Mexico.

Gene Takagi: The PATH for Charities

Gene Takagi
Gene Takagi

The PATH Act signed by President Obama late last month includes 3 key items for charities: IRA Rollover, conservation easements & food inventory gifts. Gene explains them all. He’s our legal contributor and principal of NEO, the Nonprofit & Exempt Organizations Law Group.

 


Top Trends. Sound Advice. Lively Conversation.

You’re on the air and on target as I delve into the big issues facing your nonprofit—and your career.

If you have big dreams but an average budget, tune in to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.

I interview the best in the business on every topic from board relations, fundraising, social media and compliance, to technology, accounting, volunteer management, finance, marketing and beyond. Always with you in mind.

Sign-up for show alerts!

Sponsored by:


View Full Transcript

Transcript for 271_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20150108.mp3

Processed on: 2018-11-11T23:26:19.079Z
S3 bucket containing transcription results: transcript.results
Link to bucket: s3.console.aws.amazon.com/s3/buckets/transcript.results
Path to JSON: 2016…01…271_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20150108.mp3.521484660.json
Path to text: transcripts/2016/01/271_tony_martignetti_nonprofit_radio_20150108.txt

Hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host happy new year to the live and podcast listeners happy new year again for our affiliate listeners. They had a special show last week. Happy new year, everybody! We have a listener of the week! Susan hurt on twitter she’s at susan hurt bassett. She has a thing for basset hounds clearly, and she volunteers at open door animal sanctuary in st louis, missouri. She volunteers and listens to non-profit radio, and she doesn’t merely listen, quote, i have learned a tremendous amount of valuable information from you, and i’m so inspired by your optimism and generosity, you are a true inspiration. Is that the best you can do? Susan really mean like no comparison even to god or anything like that? Susan hurt listener of the week congratulations and thank you so much for loving non-profit radio oh, i’m glad you’re with me. I’d be thrown into a log. Akufo sis, if i heard you say the words i missed today’s show, don’t burn out in twenty sixteen paul lobe has been doing social change since the vietnam war and his most recent books are soul of a citizen, and the impossible will take a little while. After nearly fifty years of activism, he has a lot to recommend about keeping yourself motivated. Day after day, we talked that opportunity collaboration twenty fifteen in x top of mexico on the beach and the path for charities. The path act, signed by president obama just late last month, includes three key items for charities the ira rollover, permanent conservation easements and food inventory gif ts jean explains them all place he’s got some other stuff for us, he’s, our legal contributor and principle of neo the non-profit and exempt organizations law group on tony’s take two thank you. We’re sponsored by pursuing full service fund-raising data driven and technology enabled, you’ll raise more money pursuant dot com. We’re also sponsored by crowdster online and mobile fund-raising software for non-profits welcome crowdster and thank you for supporting non-profit radio crowdster dot com here is paul lobe don’t burn out in twenty sixteen. Welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of opportunity collaboration twenty fifteen we’re back on the beach in x top of mexico with me is paul lobe. He’s, the author, most recently of soul of a citizen and the impossible, will take a little while, plus three other books before those those two have sold over a quarter million copies, you’ll find paul lobe the impossible dot org’s polo. Welcome to the show. Glad to be here. Thanks. I’m glad we’re together on the beach. I want to talk about avoiding burnout. A lot of your work for decades. Going back to the seventies is in activism. Citizen activism, right? Taco actually, let’s. Start with a cool story that i heard you tell about rosa parks. So it’s. Interesting. Because rosa parks is the sort of story that everyone thinks they know. You know, i can go. I can be overseas and people know the name. I can talk to eleven year olds and they know the name. Oh, yeah. She’s the lady on the bus. But what’s interesting to me is that most people know in a certain version and they know it as one day she was writing on this bus and sort of just feed retired. She just refused out of nowhere and single handedly launched the civil rights movement. You know, all by yourself is this lone heroic woman. And i get very frustrated when i hear that story because duitz it strips away the context that’s, so important. I understand that actually is much more empowering that that story. And so i look in there several elements. There’s the one he is that’s, their mistake, the element of community. So she at that point is the secretary of the end of the civil rights organization in montgomery, alabama. And she has worked for dozen years. With the co founded by her husband, that particular chapter was a barber in the city and she’s doing these sort of humble towns, like getting people to come to meetings and all the stuff that certainly is not going to make the history books or the network news or even page six of the local paper. And when you take that away and you take out all the other people that she’s working with, it becomes a sort of lone crusade, which is very much a mythology of our culture. I mean, you know, one of things i sometimes bright lad in the language around social on for ownership is lone hero. Super person. Yeah, but she’s part of a community that she’s built and there’s others in it. There’s ah, a union organizer, gotomeeting nixon who’s, the head of the local. At that point, he’s, the person who gets a very young and reluctant martin luther king involved king is all these excuses. He’s young he’s, new in town is king was reluctant to join. He was reluctant to join. Yeah, he’s reluctant step for we think of them as leaping forward, but at that point he has not really fully he’s not embraced that path. He’s still, you know well, i i’ve got divinity school. I’m going to be a minister and it’s not at all clear, that that’s going to be his direction. So he’s looking, i think warily at it and there’s a phrase i used the perfect standard, which is the notion that you need to know everything be the perfect place in your life be the combination of sort of albert einstein, gandhi, king wonder woman, mother grace, you know, add seven other people. You know, none of us is ever going to get there so and it’s also about the perfect time and place. And of course he he’s saying, well, it’s not the perfect time in place. I’m too young. I’m do knew all the excuses, you know, in his case elements of truth, but he’s their excuses. And so it’s nixon, who persists, gets king involved. And montgomery is where the world hears the king as well as in rosa parks. So when you strip that away and you make it the long hero, it ends up, i would say, being very disempowering to people, even though think it’s an inspiring story because they have to be as her work as the perceived the problem with rosa parks pristine rosa parks as opposed to the real heroism which is doing the stuff day after day after day hyre and then the second element is that they think it is a sort of accidental action. One day, her feet hurt buy-in there she wasn’t the first person refused to move to the back of the bus. There was a young woman who was actually unmarried and pregnant, they decided not from the youth section not to build a campaign around because they’re up against enough as it is latto strategic decision and these parks had got the summer before arrests, going to trainings at a place called highlander center labor and civil rights center still going in tennessee despite being burned at once by the group klux klan and so she’s meeting with an earlier generation of civil rights activists smaller moving but still certainly present and when she acts it’s intentional, intentional doesn’t mean she knows the outcome. I always said that, there’s a two, two aspects one is, you’ve gotta have a leap of faith, the minister, jim waller’s from the social justice magazine, sojourner says hope is believing in spite of the evidence and then watching the evidence change. Yeah, so, you know, by your actions, you change and you have believe in faith about the possibility, but right next to that is intentionality, which just means you’ll be strategic. So you’re looking at you’re saying, ok, what you want accomplished? How do we get there? Who are allies are the obstacles? How do we get the resource is how do we carry it out? How do we tell our stories? All the practical stuff? Of course they had to deal with that montgomery and and when parks took that leap, she also knew that it was going to be part of intentional campaign. They would run his best they could, and, you know, they’d see where late and it is, yeah, i love the story because of the intentionality aspect, and that leads us to the social change work the people are doing now, right? And where we get to the potential for burn out in all this day after day after day after work that is so intentional and so time consuming, right? And and so and so emotionally fraught. And the stakes could be, like death and disappointing. Yes. And i just pointing, yeah, yeah, you know, never enough resource is all of those kinds of things. So so i think there’s a third element that’s missing is perseverance, which is okay, you know, twelve years, if she gives up in your tender rate, we’ve never so and so and so that that carries into that question of burnout resisted. You have to keep going. So let’s, spend some time talking about empowering people toe, right? Not burn out in their day to day work as they’re going about their struggles. Where? Wherever in the world yeah, you you believe a lot in support and they do. And the disempowerment of isolation, isolation is the killer. I mean, when you feel like you’re the only one, you’re up against everything, but when you change it to okay, we’re up against a lot. But there is a on the wii doesn’t have to be thousands of people. It can be three or four people that are the ones that you rely on but it’s so easy. I mean, i i find myself i run a project. That i found it that gets students engaged in elections using the resource is of the colleges and universities shut that out, what’s the name, the campus election engagement project, listselect dot or yeah, it’s really demanding on, you know, re sources and on also sometimes, you know, really hard personnel situations and, you know, because this comes up, you hire people and sometimes problems that you and i, rem number one particularly acute situation, which really wass i mean, it was just the kind of thing we are going to details that just wrenches your heart, wrenches yourself on it had the potential to destroy the organization and and just trying to deal with my own and then, you know, call. I talked to a friend who we have really wonderful street newspaper in seattle where i live real change that we’re homeless, people sell it, and it’s, partly professional staff partly almost poses a great model and, you know, i just called my friend who ran it it’s like, ok, tim, why don’t i d’oh it’s like, you know, you really you know, this is something that you can’t you’re not large enough to handle this on your area on you know, you just hear this, you have to be ableto, you know, hard as it is to say, this person can’t be apart the organization because, you know, it’s just this otherwise you’ll be in constant crisis that we need to have support yeah, it could be it could be colleagues similarly situated in the community or across the country, right? Yeah, i could be with funders even made the tech with technologies we have, you know, it doesn’t have to be geographically focused, yeah, but you do have tohave and you have to have a team of folks i mean, on the other side is we’re doing, like, i mean, i’m asking people in my election project to basically take the culture of a college or university, get access to the administration, and we go in through some networks that they tend to work with, but even still, you know, and the student government convinced them to do something that they haven’t done before, or now that some of them now they have done because they worked with us, which is to make a priority of registering their students to vote and getting to reflect on issues and helping them turn out of the poles and all non partisan does this last? Lorts yeah, and i mean, we’re just think, okay, here it is, here’s how we’ve done it before go do it and so it’s hard. So, you know, part of even like, working it’s harder working virtually, but we have our conference calls each, you know, in the heat of it geever and me, we’re gonna do a video and we don’t go hang out or whatever, and we’re supporting each other, we’re appreciating each other’s successes were brain streaming through the do the project, we also have coaching the cohesion in the group is what sort of were being extremely were being extremely intentional cohesion doesn’t happen automatically were laughing and making jokes were talking about did something cool happened in your personal life? Two be able to sort of give people the sense that it’s not just because in our particular case, they really are physically on their own there’s not somebody in an office, but they’re off on a college campus know whether off where if they happen to live, and then they’re either talking by phone or visit making site. This is tow campuses, but they don’t have the calling next to them. So we try and very intentionally create that community because otherwise they will burn you’re tuned to non-profit radio. Tony martignetti also hosts a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy. Fund-raising fundamentals is a quick ten minute burst of fund-raising insights, published once a month. Tony’s guests are expert in crowdfunding, mobile giving event fund-raising direct mail and donor cultivation. Really, all the fund-raising issues that make you wonder, am i doing this right? Is there a better way there is? Find the fund-raising fundamentals archive it. Tony martignetti dot com that’s marketmesuite n e t t i remember there’s, a g before the end, thousands of listeners have subscribed on itunes. You can also learn maura, the chronicle website, philanthropy dot com fund-raising fundamentals, the better way. Yeah. About in in recruitment, there’s gotta be there’s gotta be things that you look for bringing people to the organization that are going to help create this cohesion, you know, it’s a good question, i’m not, and i wouldn’t say i’ve always been perfect at it. I would have had my share of fallibility, but i do think that, you know, as i learn and we all do, you know, that being able to i mean, have a strong sense of self but also know that you’re not going to do it all on your own know that you’re going to be working with others no, that have a sense of humor. I mean, if you’ve got a sense of humor and helps help cement slim and you see people in just, you know, dealing with the hardest possible, heart wrenching situations and there’s a sort of i mean, somebody called gallows humor, which french trenches humor has in-kind wartime or whatever guys get you through it’s so important in prison culture, they talk about the brotherhood of suffering, yeah, it helps to be that cohesive group, right? And so, you know, one of the stories i tell in the impossible. Take a little while is you know, they’re breaking it. Robben island prison in south africa. You know, they’re telling mandela and all those other folks, you know, you are going to rot here. The world has forgotten about you. You will never leave here alive. They isolate him in every way they can. And so they’re breaking rocks in a prison courtyard and they start whistling a freedom song and just just that, you know, okay, we’re not allowed to have this political conversation, but we all know what this means, and they’re they’re ice. They’re denied newspapers and, you know, further isolate him and they see a guard. Who’s got his tuna fish sandwich wrapped in a newspaper and throws, you know, it’s sam with sores on his paper in the trash, i take it, you know, surreptitiously under their shirt, they see a story that they think might give each other heart. And in a kind of coded script on toilet paper’s only paper. Most of them had access to the right, you know, just something that will tell that story of the outside world so that you are connected to the outside world into each other and then they pass it hand in hand, you know, when they’re waiting, you know, had lunch or whatever, but they have a chance in the yard. Yeah, so it’s just it’s those air extreme situations, but they also suggests to me that and this is the lesson of both soul of a citizen and be impossible to take a little while that in any situation, you know, you don’t have to be faced in prison. But if you’re doing difficult work, you need that camaraderie. You need that community. And you have got to be, you know, recently intentional about trading it about the scope of the work of the organization being judicious about what the organization takes on, right. So it’s not straying from mission and and stressing stressing in killing staff? Well, yeah, i think we are. I mean, i think we all face that challenge because if you’re trying to do something, i mean, i have the needs are so great, the needs are so great. And i always encourage people to think really large and to tackle big systems on a lot of times. There’s a tendency to sort of yeah, which describe it. It’s i think there’s a value in that more delimited personal work, it’s i don’t want to demean it in any way. Hyre but i remember stanford students saying very well meaning lee um, i’ve learned so much volunteering at this homeless shelter, i hope my grandchildren get the opportunity to volunteer at the same homeless shelter that i have and as his friends sort of try to gently remind him that really wasn’t the point. And so if you’re working at the homeless shelter, which is great, you wantto look upstream and you want to be able to say, okay, what am i learning from this one on one encounter? And how do i buy-in with others and joined together others to tackle homelessness on a larger platform? Because if you don’t it’s just going to the endless parade of need, so i think that that’s true and at the same time, well, where do you draw the bounds? And you look around at the issues and there poverty and inequality and climate change and, you know, went on and on, you know, police violence, i’ve got stuff on on on how do you deal with all of it? And so i think part of it is just you do have to think about what your capacity is. You do have to think about the past people. I tend to be somebody who thinks large and tries to get my project and staff to think large and probably, you know, maybe drives them a little too hard. But by my national directories is one of twenty eight year old is pretty good at balancing. All right? You know, this is what we can ask people to do. And if they do it, well, that will matter. But i have this wonderful friend who i nufer years who died at a hundred to is an environmental activist. And of course, you know what time she reaches our, you know, late eighties and nineties, um, you know, you’re asking your weather sees her secret of longevity is certainly but also her secret of being able to keep doing this work. Yeah, on dh. So, you know, one of the phrases she does that you know, you you do what you can, you can’t do everything you have to say no to people, but you could do what you can and then you could do some more, and you could do that your entire life. And then she also another point she was talking about reviving our spirits and she said, you know, you go kayaking, you go hiking, shooting both into her nineties, and she gets the mist of a smile and she says, then you come back ready to take on exxon, you know, so she’s willing to take on exxon, but she also knows that she has to go do those other things to renew her soul, you know? And, you know, and humor and just she on this sort of goes to the recruitment to you, right? You recruiting hole people? Yeah, you have other interests beyond the work that you’re you’re hiring them for your not recruiting robot? Yeah, no, absolutely. And so i think having, you know, having people who really are just i mean, it’s hard because i always when people are passionate about the car, but also but not one dimensional, but no one dimension. Yeah, yeah, and not, you know, we’re not recruiting robots. What about the idea of the bored as potential support you, you know, in times again, times of burnout. We’re not talking about yeah, fiduciary responsibilities, but hyre valuable to have a couple of trusted board members who, you know, i would you can’t trust confide in i mean, i would say the trusted people can be anywhere, so i think, you know, if they’re on the board that’s terrific, you know? And there was also i mean, sometimes you sort of worry, will you exposure in, er, you know, the afraid of the classic phrase about politics and sausage making it’s like you really don’t want to see how the sausage is made? I mean, there was there at least those those sure are mediators and made sausage sometimes i really don’t want to see how it’s made and, you know, do you expose the inner workings that boardmember than thinking, oh, my god, this is like, you know, we’re in crisis, we’re in crisis, you know, you know, and the same things too, with funders, i mean, certainly myself, you know, there’s funders who i have a very serious, trusting relationship you really do want to know and who i trust if they recognise that oh, everything is not going perfectly, but this is true in any organization and is not and is perfectly compatible with doing astounding work. You know, i remember i had a staffer once was running operation brilliant, brilliant guy and you, you know, innovated. A lot of the things that moved us forward is an organization about at one point he liked to plan, which is good because he brought. He brought us to a higher level of planning, and planning is really good, but at one point, he said, it’s supposed to election, he said, you planned all this stuff out and, you know, it’s all going out, it’s all happening, different blade. Yeah, and i’m like and yes, and that’s always going to be the way it isthe it is gonna happen differently and the planning with good and it makes us respond, you know more effectively, but there’s always going to be if you’re doing anything worthwhile, ambitious enough to be worthwhile, there are always gonna be things coming in from left field and purples and what not and it’s just how about sort of going backto what the one hundred two year old activist saying she kayaks, etcetera, right? And he’s mischievous? I mean, she remember us hundred two years, i think, like he was busy in your party little chablis apartment lived on second, section eight subsidence dilgence social security, which, when she was twenty three years old, is a young union activist should help lobbied through one of the first public pension programs in america became a model for social security, so something she didn’t twenty three or four benefits there are ninety eight and nine, one hundred, and i think her i can’t see what she was talking about her landlord and said, well, you know what? If something happens, you know? Yeah, just dig a hole in the backyard didn’t pretty small letter and take up my case, you know? She just was she didn’t know there was one point. Yeah, there was a reason in central america something there was a congressman did she met. It was very active in the audubon society and who very condescendingly in the way that when does towards the old and the young i said to her, oh, so i hear you’re a birdwatcher like isn’t that? And she said, yes, there’s a lot of birds in washington d c but been watching these days, but i was thinking of the kayaking, she she takes care of herself, she takes care of its just got this wonderful sense of humor, right? And she’s a kayaker and yes, you know, so having similar to recruiting people who aren’t one dimensional, not being one dimensional yourself. Yeah, i mean, you do have to take care of yourself. You do? I’m a big proponent of naps. Yeah, i’ve blogged about the the the the love i have for napping. But whatever it is you do, you need to have something outside. Yeah, yeah, i know. And it’s true and, you know, and again, i think we all wrestle with i mean, i certainly rest that it’s like, yeah, you know, my wife’s going out to see a play? I’m she works very. She works very hard, but in a more contained space, probably ad, you know, and i’m like, yeah, i got this deadline i got to do this, you know? But you know, if i over the years, i’m a runner. And run early sixties been running since i’m fifteen and fortunately, my knees haven’t given out and so, you know, if i go run, i also live in seattle, so i get to run by water. But, you know, if i’m traveling, lecturing on the road, it’s, like i take a break, which because i make it sound like my living, you know, i take a break and i run along usually if there’s water around, i’m going to run along the river or the stream of the, you know, whatever the lake and it just, you know, physically, it flushes me, you know, the toxicity out of you, but it also just, you know, it gives you a space and it’s it’s, you feel better afterwards? Endorphins, there’s lot to be said for endorphins, flood flow. All that stuff suppressing the stress hormones. Yeah, yeah, i can think of offhand. Well, dahna general in one of them. Yeah. Suppressing those. Yeah, and building up endorphins. And yet, yeah. And i think also things like diet. Yeah. He’s getting enough sleep? Yeah, yeah. I mean, i called. I mean, i called the holy trinity of, you know, exercise diet, which includes, um, good supplements. So yeah. Okay. Now, now, there’s not a not on the suicide. Very practical. And you know what? Yeah, you are dealing with serious dressed. This will help. Uh, this will lower your cortisone there’s. Another right doesn’t stretch on and, you know, and sleep, were i my sleep tends not to be that great. So i just figure okay, i’m gonna log nine hours to get a where you get seven and a half, okay? You know, and you know, and that helps about switch gears a bit to the two donor-centric dahna burnout, right? You know, i’ve been doing this. I’ve been supporting this cause a long time. I feel like it’s time to move on. I need any advice around that. Well, i think part of what happens is people have this constant pressure to sort of see the quick short term results and a lot of times howard’s in new york by accepting the impossible take a little while, the greatest story. And he talks about the optimism of uncertain you don’t know when the moment will turn you go backto parks of all the wasn’t like she was doing lots of things for twelve years as they all were one of them little spark. But you couldn’t anticipate which and so i think, it’s, very it’s. Very easy to sort of say that success is for human dignity that we’ve had were inevitable civil rights movement. Of course. Eventually they would have revealed gay rights in eventually. Well, our environmental challenges open question whether we will be able to you do what we need. Well, we are able to do what we need climate change. But they have the will is yeah, the will for it. I mean, right now, you know, the technology is there. Renewables have now passed, you know, they are cheaper than coal. There are equal with fossil fuel without any externalities at all. And you know, when next molly’s it’s not even close, so but will we have the political will? I don’t know. Um, it depends on us and you and the stakes are pretty ultimate because, you know, we’re talking about the habitability of the planet. So, you know, when i when i look at it, you know what i what i see is donors being subject to the same schools is the rest of us, but possibly possibly in a more immediate way because they’re not actual sum of money but a lot of making sure they aren’t in the field, they’re they’re dealing with, you know, with them, you know, then the publicans of hands, possibly and it’s so and they’re getting reports, but they may not even have time to read the reports and, you know, depends on how good the people are a storytelling and so i think and, you know, let’s, be honest, at least some issues, they they may be insulated by privilege, they’re not, you know, they’re not seeing in their social circle, and i remember talking with one of our funders, and she said, well, she has a couple different pieces, like one of her groups, they are just not always down in silicon valley, they are just not at all concerned about this stuff at all and, you know, so she’s in an environment that is not reinforcing her concern yeah, yeah, that’s but, you know, that makes it harder to continue as a donor, then everyone’s talking about these urgent issues and oh, yeah and, you know, here you are, so you’re trying to address them, so i think you know, the challenges well for the rest of us, to try and offer that perspective in our work, which is hard because we’re often mean again, the stakes couldn’t be life and death, you know, they’re huge, even if they’re not immediately life and death wait care passionate about our summit is to myself, it’s like this is what we can do, and we want to put these many people on the ground in our states in time to really work with the school’s for this election and the clock is ticking and, you know, so theo, from the donor perspective, if you want to try and really see that long term, you know, i mean, and of course, you want to be rigorous and you want all the rest of this stuff, but not get but see that long term goal is here long term goal recognize the the short term, the short term impacts we can have, right? And but you also see the longer the wait and see how things build on the other thing i think is, you know, there’s a certain, you know, i would argue that our our culture, including certain the non-profit donor intersection, has that has adopted on obsession with certain kinds of measurement to the detriment of other kinds of metro meant measurement. And so it’s, metrix, metrix, metrix, metrix. And i mean, i mean, i’ve been seattle in a city where it’s particularly talks because we’ve got a tech culture. And yeah, some of the numbers could be exceptionally important. Question about that. But here’s, a story that embodies the process of what’s occurring. That can be equally indicative. And so when you’re trying to evaluate impact, which is a reasonable and good things, you want to take that broad, long term picture. And you want to get the understand all the different ripples of a particular organization you’re supporting our considering supporting on. That that’s that can be as warm or important. Then then the numbers, you know, and not to dismiss the numbers, you know, but another way of measuring there’s qualitative his bed storytelling as well. Yeah, but, you know, in which can include numbers which can include numbers the air of i mean, you know, when i talked to donors, they know we have some very good numbers on our project. Yeah. Mark, best calculations. A couple hundred thousand students who voted our last year who wouldn’t have otherwise? This is huge, you know, for a tiny minute budget of labbate. Ah, half less than half a million dollar budget for that level of impact is amazing. Yeah, yeah. You have about a minute left or so you’ve been doing activism. What? Forty some years? Forty something years. It creeps up on you. What do you love about it? Why do you keep forty you? Why so long? What do you love? Well, some of it’s that the work continues to need to be doing dahna but some of it is that you do. I think the old skills and you build a sense of capability. And you can see things happen that you’ve done or and this is what i would say is that every way the books that i write try a likely impossible soul try to connect people to a broader stream of people working for such for social justice that started way before any of us were born and is going to continue long after we die. And if we feel connected that stream, it can help carry us, and we can help carry others. Add to me that’s a lot of what keeps me doing it because it means that not only do i have a community that supports in the current time, but i have a community historical time, which i could see is supporting, and that makes you an awful lot of difference. Follow-up he’s written five books, most recent, our soul of a citizen and the impossible will take a little while you’ll find him at the impossible dot org’s paul, thank you so much. My pleasure. A real pleasure talking to you. Thanks a lot. On the beach on the durney martignetti non-profit radio coverage of opportunity collaboration. Twenty fifteen. Thanks so much for being with us. Boy was good listening. To that beach on dh paul lobe sharing so much jean takagi and the path act for charities coming up first. Pursuant you know them, they’ve been with non-profit radio for six months supporting us. They have fund-raising management software for small and midsize shops. It’s it’s that simple. Use the tools you need and don’t subscribe to the other ones. I presume you need to raise more money in twenty sixteen than you did twenty fifteen growth is good, they’ve got the tools to help you do that like they’re a prospector and velocity. So check him out. You know what? What? Ah, they’re ideal for small and midsize non-profits what’re you waiting for for pizza pursuant dot com welcome crowdster just like it sounds they do crowdfunding, but not the usual. Their crowd funding sites are elegant and simple and fast, so easy for your admin, though in the back end and super easy for your donors. I had two long talks with ceo joe ferraro, and we both decided that crowdster is perfect for non-profit radio listeners, in fact, he runs a charity himself, which helps orphans globally, and he runs crowdster on the the guy likes to stay busy. What can you say? Um, you can talk to him. You know how i love picking up the phone and talking to people to do business. Give him a call. Five one, six, five o one, ninety three, double six if you want to check them out first crowdster dot com they really do make very good looking sites. Now. It’s time for tony’s. Take two. Thank you for loving non-profit radio over the holidays. I read the testimonials on itunes, which ah, i got a couple of non-profit radio listener that’s what he or she called themselves said tony’s, an animated host who knows how to conduct a good interview black oak games. Even though tony is interviewing the guests, it feels natural and they have a true, too way conversation, which i really appreciate. Back-up richard tony’s, a skillful interviewer who attracts great expert guests, thank you so much for that and all the other comments that air on on itunes and the other feedback i get, especially on twitter, thank you so much. I don’t even i don’t even have a sarcastic come back for those just thank you and you know, i hope. That i always do want your feedback, good or bad? That’s tony’s, take two. I got chink takagi on the line. You know, jean takagi is the managing attorney of neo the non-profit and exempt organizations law group in san francisco. He and it’s the wildly popular non-profit law blogged dot com and he’s at g tack on twitter happy new year jean takagi. Happy new year durney great to be here. Thank you again. This would be your fifth year. I believe we’re beginning your five. I think it’s been a good long run. I’m glad. Glad to have you back another year. That’s. Amazing. Tony and its great teo continue having our conversation. So thank you. All right, um, before we get into the path act, there is something that you alerted me to just happened yesterday. The irs had this proposal for acknowledging gif ts of two hundred fifty dollars, or more. And they have withdrawn the proposal. Can you can you get us up to date? Sure. Um, and so that’s. Ah ah, great new happening for the nonprofit sector. Although we have cem cem maybe controversial or dissenting about about that, we’ll get there. Go. Ahead. Okay. Object in your presentation, please. So let’s, start by saying what? What? What? The proposal wass and it was for providing an alternative for donors tio evidence that they actually have made a charitable contribution of two hundred fifty dollars, arm or under existing laws, donors are required to have a written receipt that contains certain information, including, you know what, the chick who the charity is, what amount of the contribution is, and importantly, there must be a statement on that receipt that says no goods or services were provided by the charity and return assuming that was the case. If donors don’t maintain that receipt, then they could get their deductions denied, even if they had actually made the contributions right. The time of getting that receipt, they must have that receipt in hand, or it must have been prepared before the donor files their tax return. It’s no good to do it after they’ve been audited and can’t produce that. So that was the original problem. So the irs said, well, you know, we should make up a rule that allows the charity tow, have some responsibility as well if they opto have it and it is really important which you’ve pointed out to me, said it is optional for the charity under this new rule, which ultimately was withdrawn. But the proposal was that the charity could file another information, return to the irs with the donor’s name, the amount of the contribution and the donor’s social security number, and that would be in lieu of providing a proper receipts the donor, and meeting those requirements of having a proper written receipt so that would evidence a charitable contribution to charity would take on the burden at its options, and you go about it there’s that the donor loses the receipt, or the charity didn’t issue the receipt with the right information about that no goods or services were provided to the charity. In return, it was still ok, everything was good. The donation was good because charity filed that information return with the irs, that evidence the contribution, that that the big dispute about that and why a lot of non-profit organizations, especially the big advocacy and national organisations got upset was because of the social security numbers that the non-profits would have to collect if they wanted to file that return, right? Ok, s o the need for the social security number makes sense because that’s the identifying part, may that’s the identifying the piece of data so it’s clear why it’s needed, and i just want to point out that this has been a problem just taking a little step back. It’s been a problem where donors and you and i have talked about this, so i make it clear for everybody. Donors have had their deductions denied because they don’t get or don’t keep well, i guess it’s more don’t get from the from the non-profits that contemporaneous acknowledgment that they need so this has been a problem area. And as you said, iris was trying to address it. You were, i’ll give you first shot we have is we didn’t really have a difference of opinion on the substance of this, that there was something around it that was troubling me. But you were very much opposed to this and a lot of others. You’re right. The big dick secure. Oops around the concern about that having that social security number metoo yeah. Thanks for letting me first time. Yeah. You know, the big problem is identity theft is a huge and growing problem both for individuals and the country itself. Identity theft is a huge problem, and the federal government has been i’m saying as a matter of policy, t people into agencies don’t collect social security numbers unless you absolutely have to, because there’s a danger in not adequately protecting them. So if non-profits opted to do this, they would have to make sure that they had adequate protections not to allow those social security numbers to get into other people’s hands. Andi so that was one of the big problems is could non-profit adequately protect the social security numbers if they didn’t really understand the rules regarding protection of what it’s called personally identifiable information that would allow people teo steal a person’s identity and there are a lot of laws around that and non-profits probably don’t know many of those laws and might accept the burden of taking on the ocean security numbers and filing that new information returned because they didn’t know about the laws, and that would create more liability for charities. That was the big problem. The other problem that comes up a scam artist would now be able to call donors. And ask for their social security numbers on behalf of a charity that they know that the donors are associating with so they might show up at a charity event. No, get to meet some people there, give them a call and ask for the social security numbers is part of the scam saying that they represent the charity, get that social security number and then commit identity, you know, theft that way as well. But those are a couple of the big, big problem that we had with this and, well, i’ll let you go next, and i have an additional tried t try to be civil about these things now in the place where we different was was not the substance i agree with your concerns and all the other agencies and and bloggers who are concerned about the substance of what opting in would mean my disagreement was why do we presume? It seemed like so many people were presuming that non-profits weren’t bright enough? Tow opt out of this, remember it’s totally optional. So why are we presuming that non-profits would opt in with great, vast unawareness of what it means to protect someone? Social security number versus presuming that the non-profits would say, you know that that opens up it’s up to some real potential liability and expenses of protection and software. So let us not opt in it’s a great point, and i don’t want to be little the expertise on dh ah skill that that non-profit leaders bring throughout the country, and certainly there are smart leaders throughout the sector, and the sector is the most trusted of all of the sectors by far and there’s reason for that. On the other hand, tony, last five years we’ve had more than six hundred thousand non-profit organisations lose their tax exemptions for failure to file with the irs. We’ve also had probably more than half of the organization’s they’ll tow register and states to engage in charitable solicitations in the state. Um, and, you know, part of that has to do just with a failure to understand some of the laws that may apply in the laws change from time to time, creating new requirements, which is case with the irs and smaller non-profits having to file all of a sudden, but also there had been a lack of really enforcement by different agencies. On non-profits because non-profits were trusted so much and a lot of scandals that have been coming up, you know, mostly because of the media attention that focused on a really pew of very isolated number. But very bad actors now has raised the enforcement level from from all the agencies. And because non-profits are not used to this level enforcement, it could easily oversee the neto to really adequately protect itself on legal compliance issues and that’s what we see a lot really well intentioned non-profits really bright leaders, but not being used to this level of enforcement. That’s our big concern with social security numbers. All right, let’s, go out for a break, gene, you and i’ll keep talking about this subject for just ah, a couple of minutes after the break, and then we got to move on to the path act. Um all right, so keep it civil. I do have to have something to say in response, but let’s, let’s, take a break and gene and i’ll be right back. Like what you’re hearing a non-profit radio tony’s got more on youtube, you’ll find clips from stand up comedy tv spots and exclusive interviews catch guests like seth gordon. Craig newmark, the founder of craigslist marquis of eco enterprises, charles best from donors choose dot org’s aria finger do something that worked neo-sage levine from new york universities heimans center on philanthropy tony tweets to he finds the best content from the most knowledgeable, interesting people in and around non-profits to share on his stream. If you have valuable info, he wants to re tweet you during the show. You can join the conversation on twitter using hashtag non-profit radio twitter is an easy way to reach tony he’s at tony martignetti narasimhan t i g e n e t t i remember there’s a g before the end he hosts a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy fund-raising fundamentals is a short monthly show devoted to getting over your fund-raising hartals just like non-profit radio, toni talks to leading thinkers, experts and cool people with great ideas. As one fan said, tony picks their brains and i don’t have to leave my office fund-raising fundamentals was recently dubbed the most helpful non-profit podcast you have ever heard. You can also join the conversation on facebook, where you can ask questions before or after the show. The guests were there, too. Get insider show alerts by email. Tony tells you who’s on each week and always includes link so that you can contact, i guess, directly. To sign up, visit the facebook page for tony martignetti dot com. Lively conversation. Top trends. Sound advice, that’s, tony martignetti non-profit radio. And i’m ken berger from charity navigator. We have such a treasure trove of drops that occasionally people move on. So that was king burger, formerly ceo of charity navigator. Sam will have teo to take that one out of the rotation, but there are many others. Okay, jeanne, now you mentioned the way can’t devote a couple more minutes of this and we’ll get carried away. You mentioned, you know, the six hundred thousand or so now that lost their tax exempt status for failure to file three years in a row, even just a little return little postcard. But we know that a lot of those were defunct, you know, out of out of commission organizations. Not all but a lot of those were that were so they wouldn’t be soliciting. Continue. Teo, get donations anyway of any size. All right? And then you you mentioned charity registration that hits my sweet spot. Of course, we know that i do that part of my practices, keeping charity’s compliant in each state where they are soliciting donations on your right there’s a lot of lack of awareness. I say that a lot when i’m speaking in training and even for those who are aware there’s a lot of misunderstanding of it. So i i grant that i just ah, sametz dahna from, you know, it’s, just the seams, the constant presumption that charity’s won’t figure it out and do it correctly. Andi, just not up to opt in. Ah. Okay, i guess. You know, i’m pretty much just repeating myself. I don’t know anything else you want to. You want to add to that to that discussion? Well, i’ll just add that if donors really want to be sure that they’re going to get a deduction, they should really just ask the charities to make sure that they maintain permanently the receipt that was issued to them at the time. So if the donor loses at the charity will maintain it permanently, or at least for the number of years where they could go back, um, to make that deduction and that will have the same effect. Okay. Okay. But i mean, donors have responsibility too. You know, the charity sends you an acknowledgement letter or e mails it to you. You want to save it, you know. Ah, charity’s only do so much for tow. Hand hold their donors and then it becomes the donor’s. Fault. Really? Okay. Um, let’s move to the path act protecting americans against tax hike. I believe as a path and there’s ah, there’s stuff in there for charities. And most significantly, the ira rollover made permanent. Yeah, i mean it’s a really interesting act and is part of this greater bill that was signed into law but there’s three charitable giving provisions that were originally established this temporary laws and year by year they were extended for for the following year. But because congress would wait until, like, december of each year to make retroactive so effective for the previous night, that was so annoying, they would do it like november or october or something and give you, you know, thirty days or sixty days to market and promote it infinite into your your fourth quarter, but busiest time fund-raising plan. It was crazy. Yeah, and sometimes it what? There wasn’t enough time, particularly with the ira charitable roll over. So let’s talk about the diver roll over first, so that the provisions of the ira charitable roll over, which was first available in two thousand seven, allowed individuals age seventeen and a half older to donate up to one hundred thousand from their traditional or their roth iras latto eligible public charity. So no donor buy-in funds, no private foundations, no supporting work. And you didn’t have to count those distributions to charities as taxable income. Yes, very important. Yeah. And so that would be separate because i mean otherwise. At seventeen and a half, you have to start taking distribution from your iras and that’s typically taxable income to you. So instead of taking it and then making a gift of it, which you know you could get a terrible contribution from you just don’t include it in your income. It all right? So right. The nice thing about about that if you don’t get it, actually not included his income and take a charitable deduction because that would be double dipping, but but you don’t reflected in your gross income, which has a lot of different benefits that it that are even better than it’s been getting a charitable deductions so you don’t want to recognize it is income and then take it as a deduction. You want to make sure this is done right? Which means that the ira has to be made directly to the public charity and eggs. I can’t go through you first as an individual and then tow a public charity. Right there is there is an exception to that gene. If, ah, one of the years it was, it was available, there was ah, you know what they call them? Not private letter rulings, but attacks alert or something that if the charity writes the check payable to the sorry the ira custodian, your ira custodian writes the cheque payable to the charity and sends that to you and then you that you then convey that check to the charity that’s. Okay, that that does qualify as a as what? This is really a qualified charitable distributions. Technically, not a roll over, but i just want to say so that’s a possibility. And the other way, the other group of people that this could be really valuable for is non itemizers. Because if you’re not itemizing you, don’t you don’t earn a chat, you know, claim a charitable federal income tax deduction. You take the standard deduction, but you can benefit from this. Roll over and be a non itemizers. Still get the benefit? Yeah. That’s absolutely right. So most people don’t itemize their deductions, so getting a lower growth income on dh, lower taxable income, in effect is much, much better than nothing at all, which is what would happen if you’re a non itemizers and you make a gift to cherish and, of course, that’s a big benefit. Also another benefit of a lower growth income, which would happen by making the charitable roll over, is that your tax treatment of social security benefits is better and you have a lower medicare premium as well, right there they’re all based on taxable income thresholds, right? Exactly right? So the extent you can keep your taxable income lower, you’ll you’ll get you’ll have greater benefits in the store security area and and others too very true, and we don’t want to get too much into this, i think is an hour to go through them, but another big benefit of certain states charging income tax to their residents, the state income tax, but i don’t recognize a charitable contribution deduction for state income tax purposes, but they will take the lower growth income based on the charitable contribution exactly made from from the ira. So again, another benefit that you wouldn’t get if you took in the ira as income and then made a gift out, so this rollover provisions is really beneficial and has been seen tio for the years that it’s been around has been seen to be a very, very valuable tool for forgetting jean. We have to we have to move past that now because we promised people all three components of the path act and we only have about a minute and a half left, so i’m going to sort of summarize the first one for gifts of food inventory. Non si corporations can now can now deduct ah greater amount up to their basis there there cost plus fifty percent of the fair market value and for non si corpse that used to be limited to just your basis in that food inventory. If i even the playing field now so that small businesses could get the same benefit big businesses which are typical, see corporations so really nice to see that you can get not only a deduction of your coffee of the food that you’re donating, but half of the profits you would have made if you sold it and well. Seymour contributions from food to food banks because of that. Excellent. Okay. And you got to be concise on the third one. I’ll let you go. We just have a minute left. Okay? Landowners can deduct the value of a conservation easements land that they’re giving up their development rights over so that there’s preserve preservation natural resource is the old rule. Thirty percent of your adjusted gross income for up to six years could be deducted. The new rule. Fifty percent of your adjusted gross, thinkin and up to sixteen years. So really promoting land conservation. That’s why i let gene explain it. You see how much more articulately and concisely he does it than i do. Thank you, jean. Thanks. Study. Jean takagi, managing attorney of neo non-profit exempt organizations, law group and our monthly legal contributor. You’ll find him on twitter at g tak g t a next week. Tips from maria part do maria sample back with smart tips from her book magnify your business if you missed any part of today’s show, find it on tony martignetti dot com where in the world else would you go? There’s little flat on go i’m still thinking about this for twenty sixteen, i’m not. I’m not sure. Responsive by pursuing online tools for small and midsize non-profits data driven and technology enabled pursuing dot com. We’re also sponsored by crowdster. Welcome again, online and mobile fund-raising software for non-profits crowdster dotcom are creative producers. Claire meyerhoff, sam legal, which is the line producer. Gavin dollars, are am and fm outreach director, and the show’s social media is by dina russell. Our music is by scott stein. Be with me next week for non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent go out and degree. Yeah. What’s not to love about non-profit radio tony gets the best guests check this out from seth godin this’s the first revolution since tv nineteen fifty and henry ford nineteen twenty it’s the revolution of our lifetime here’s a smart, simple idea from craigslist founder craig newmark yeah insights, orn presentation or anything? People don’t really need the fancy stuff they need something which is simple and fast. When’s the best time to post on facebook facebook’s andrew noise nose at traffic is at an all time hyre on nine a m or eight pm so that’s, when you should be posting your most meaningful post here’s aria finger ceo of do something dot or ge young people are not going to be involved in social change if it’s boring and they don’t see the impact of what they’re doing. So you got to make it fun and applicable to these young people look so otherwise a fifteen and sixteen year old they have better things to do if they have xbox, they have tv, they have their cell phones. Me dar is the founder of idealist took two or three years for foundation staff, sort of dane toe add an email address card, it was like it was phone. This email thing is right and that’s why should i give it away? Charles best founded donors choose dot or ge somehow they’ve gotten in touch kind of off line as it were on dh and no two exchanges of brownies and visits and physical gift. Mark echo is the founder and ceo of eco enterprises. You may be wearing his hoodies and shirts. Tony, talk to him. Yeah, you know, i just i i’m a big believer that’s not what you make in life. It sze, you know, tell you make people feel this is public radio host majora carter. Innovation is in the power of understanding that you don’t just put money on a situation expected to hell. You put money in a situation and invested and expect it to grow and savvy advice for success from eric sabiston. What separates those who achieve from those who do not is in direct proportion to one’s ability to ask others for help. The smartest experts and leading thinkers air on tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent.

My Top Stuff From 2015

My last video of 2015 highlights the year’s top videos and Nonprofit Radio episodes. They include stand-up comedy; the Charitable IRA Rollover; and peer-to-peer fundraising.

Top 4 Videos:
Top 3 Nonprofit Radio Episodes:
2014 Giving Review & 2015 Forecast (I’ll do the 2015 Giving Review & 2016 Forecast on 1/29/16)