The American Red Cross took a risk last year: it mailed video cameras to 300 families or individuals who had received services from Red Cross and asked them to tell their stories. The risk paid off with a brilliant campaign, featuring 25 home-made video testimonials edited to about 30 seconds each.
#STORYTELLING: How To Be Better At Telling Stories
If you can reduce your organization’s whole reason for being to a story packed with suffering and hope, love and pain, loss and victory – about people you can recognize as being like you – then you can attract support. Network for Good has a brief article with 7 useful tips for becoming a better […]
#COMMUNICATIONS: Keep Storytelling In Forefront, Whatever Platforms You Use
Oprah Winfrey likes a book. BOOM! It’s a best-seller and a big movie. Justin Bieber retweets something that catches his eye. POW! It’s trending huge for forty-eight hours! Who wouldn’t want that kind of attention? Well, often nonprofits and charities don’t want that kind of attention. The best/worst case of this kind of virality is […]
#COMMUNCATIONS: Blog Loud & Proud & As Often As Content Warrants
A truism/maxim/cliché that has long inspired me whenever I start a new project is, “You can fight without ever winning. But you’ll never win without a fight.” The statement inspires me because it prepares me for the possibility of not succeeding while reminding me that the only failure is not being willing to try. And […]
#SOCIALNETWORKS: Facebook Opens Timeline To Organizations
On Leap-Day Wednesday Facebook took a leap to the social-media future for nonprofits and businesses by opening up features that had hitherto been accessible only to individuals. Those features – of which Timeline is perhaps creating the most buzz – will be hidden until 30 March if you wish, so you have time to play […]
#Fundraising: Make A Video — Grow Your Outreach
Telling stories is one of the elemental qualities of humans. We love to tell them, hear them, and watch them. But sometimes changing media can short-circuit our storytelling instincts as we work our way through the technology yet allow the narrative to dissolve. In the nonprofit world, one of the great developments in media is […]
Communications: Telling Stories To Touch Lives & Raise Money
Telling and listening to stories is what we humans do. The story could be about our morning commute or about three Russian brothers wrestling with their rocky relationships after the murder of their cantankerous father. But what makes either of those stories compelling is the opportunity for story teller to touch the experiences, expectations, and […]
Communications: Why Some Stories Work Better Than Others
Andy Goodman, a highly regarded communications consultant, reflects on the principle of “the golden theme” that runs through all great stories – then demonstrates how nonprofits can use this principle to best effect. Download “Freerange” — his monthly newsletter on best practices here. Guest blogger Don Akchin writes frequently about marketing and philanthropy at […]
