working with nonprofits since 1998
Raising money for a nonprofit or charity is tough work. With the focus of the organization on fundraising, it is not surprising that outreach tends to focus on the numbers (the thousands who benefit from the nonprofit's work, the millions required to … [Read more]
Chris Forbes is the co-author of Guerrilla Marketing for Nonprofits and a certified guerrilla-marketing coach. His varied background in marketing includes experience in the faith sector and work on five continents, and he has pioneered several media … [Read more]
We have been using Tumblr for a few years and in the hopes of inspiring you and your colleagues to consider creation of a Tumblr presence for your nonprofit by sharing some insights we've gained on using this very popular social network. Tumblr … [Read more]
Christopher Davenport is the founder of 501 Videos, a company that makes videos exclusively for nonprofit clients. His experience includes years in Hollywood working on commercial films and, later, making documentaries. His website is home to Movie … [Read more]
The Alzheimer's Association of the US has just published a sobering report on the growing presence of Alzheimer's among the growing number of retirees and older Baby Boomers. Those who suffer from the disease require, in the early stages, expensive … [Read more]
Alzheimer’s is a word most of us have heard, but how many of us know much about the disease itself? Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is an irreversible progressive brain disease that slowly destroys memory and thinking skills and, eventually, the ability to … [Read more]
Allison Fine researches and writes about the intersection of social media and social change. She is the co-author (with Beth Kanter) of the bestselling book, The Networked Nonprofit: Connecting with Social Media to Drive Change, as well as the … [Read more]
About Gray Memories Gray Memories follows "The Man" (Ken Vorspan) on his existential journey through the backstreets of Cambridge, Massachusetts in search of the mysterious "Leon". Will his quest be realized or is Leon just another figment of The … [Read more]
Social networks can be so important for communicating with folks who support (or will support) your cause. The high speed and low cost of such outreach can offer huge dividends, but mostly those dividends are paid in good will and spurring interest. … [Read more]
With only a few months to go before the new administration takes office, we examine the notion of 'grass-roots' as associated with popular movements or opinions came into the American lexicon at the turn of the twentieth century. The, er, 'grass … [Read more]
The Challenge: Many of our clients require slide presentations as training materials or as speaker support and they're looking to get away from the dreaded "Death by PowerPoint" experience. Our Solution: We work with our clients to develop a … [Read more]
Rob Wu is co-founder of Causevox, an online social-media and donor-acquisition platform, and he and his team have been working hard over the last number of months moving the online system to 2.0. We had the pleasure of talking with Rob a year or so … [Read more]
Michael Hoffman is co-founder and CEO of See3 Communications and a leading authority on online video for nonprofits and online fundraising and outreach strategies. After turns as a political consultant and developer of Internet startups, he founded … [Read more]
The Challenge: How to present an engaging arts and lifestyle magazine television series in a top 50 market where the main competitor is not similar shows on local television, but streaming-video via the Internet. Our Solution: MKCREATIVE put … [Read more]
Educators! Bring history to life in your classroom with this PBS LearningMedia webinar featuring documentary filmmaker, Ken Burns, live-streamed last year. Read more about the webinar and watch a recording of it here. … [Read more]
Why Computer Literacy is Key to Winning the 21st Century Let’s not make ourselves obsolete … “Upending our notions of what it means to interface with computers could help democratize the biggest engine of wealth since the Industrial … [Read more]
The idea of using Twitter can overwhelm some, and how to use it as a smart tool for strategic engagement seems downright contradictory to many. Yet as the social-networking platform matures - Rather, as the people who use it explore that myriad ways … [Read more]
If you haven't yet seen Dan Pallotta's 18-minute TED talk, the viral video of the month (April 2013) with more than 1.2 million views, here's your chance. Pallotta, who founded AIDS Ride and raised $581 million for AIDS and breast cancer research … [Read more]
Last year we explored Pinterest, a social network that puts a premium on visuals and offers 'pin boards' of topics collected/bookmarked/'pinned' by the user. The metrics on the platform show amazing growth over the last few months, and many are still … [Read more]
The Challenge: The Knowledge Fountain offers not-for-profit organizations a spectrum of short courses online covering fundraising, communications, organizational development, social media, and productivity software. It is a start-up venture … [Read more]
This is a repost of an article that originally appeared on the MKCREATIVE blog in May, 2010. The business/education/PR presentation got a boost in the '90s when Microsoft PowerPoint gave us the opportunity to turn the staid lecture (from Lectio, … [Read more]
Brainwashing comes in many forms...even talk radio and right-wing media. THE BRAINWASHING OF MY DAD is going to have its film festival world premiere at the prestigious Cinequest Film Festival in San Jose, CA. If you live in California, we hope … [Read more]
Idea Index is a great series we'd like to recommend. This edition is particularly useful when a designer needs to brainstorm different looks and approaches and is pressed for time. From the dust-jacket: "Don't let the size fool you. Inside you'll … [Read more]
You know you want to... We are often extolling the virtues of particular social-networking platforms or encouraging specific strategies to reach out to your audience(s) across these platforms. When moving through the 'tubes' of our social … [Read more]
#BOOKREVIEW: I read Blink on a plane to London last year and was thoroughly taken with Gladwell's thesis: that the brain works very quickly to analyse information and come to a conclusion that informs us through the medium of "a feeling" or a "gut … [Read more]
In February, 2013, we talked about what Facebook's latest feature, Graph Search, is (namely, a way to combine keywords, categories, and what friends are saying about them within Facebook) and it is not (namely, a challenger to Google's search … [Read more]
We welcome back Paul Jolly, Director of Jump Start Growth, Inc., a nonprofit fundraising and consultancy in Washington DC. Today, Paul tells about the importance of breaking the donor-donation barrier. Many good therapists will tell you your … [Read more]
I’ll not wax poetic here, this is exactly what it says on the tin: if you are shooting with a film camera, or just thinking about it, read on. This article is for you. Get A Vintage Camera Vintage film cameras can be surprisingly … [Read more]
Is it a Mac? Is it a PC? It's Virtualization! In 2014 on Tech Fridays, we looked at virtualization software that allows you to run multiple operating systems on one desktop or laptop. In a repost of the second article in this series, we covered … [Read more]
(This is a repost of an article that previously appeared in 2012) Last week we introduced the idea of virtualization and how you can run Windows programs on an Apple laptop or desktop. Virtualization goes the other way as well, but who would want … [Read more]
A while back we talked about the blogging platform Tumblr, and the series got a great deal of response from you our audience, and we really appreciate your interest and feedback! We want to step up that earlier discussion with a series of video … [Read more]
We introduced Scoop.it and Pinterest recently because we think these information-sharing sites offer a great platform for nonprofits and charities to share their own news as well as related images or stories in their sectors. As promised we have … [Read more]