Now that #GivingTuesday has come and gone, it’s critical that non-profit organizations, who actively ran campaigns encouraging prospective donors to give that day, take the following two actions:

#1: Say “thank you”:

• Capitalize on all the various communications platforms your organization uses, such as social media, your website, and e-newsletter, to repeat your message of thanks — reinforcing your gratitude and ensuring it is seen by appropriate audiences.

#2: Share your successes:

• As soon as the figures are available, but ideally within a week of #GivingTuesday, share the actual dollar amount you were hoping to achieve in donations, and the percentage of goal attained:
  • “We had hoped for $500,000 in donations on #GivingTuesday and are thrilled to report that we met and exceeded that goal by 10%.”
  • “While we had set a #GivingTuesdsay goal of $25,000, donations totaled only 75% of that; we hope to make up that difference through our year-end giving campaign, and ask for your help.”
• As expressed in our “Let GivingTuesday Donors Know Where Their $ Will Go” post, share how donation $$ will be spent.

All of the above should position your organization well to ask for and receive both year-end 2017 and #GivingTuesday 2018 donations.

In our 5 Simple Tips to “Grow Big” on #GivingTuesday post, we shared how critical it is to the success of fundraising campaigns to share specifics about services provided to constituents, i.e., where past donations have gone. But, in the days leading up to #GivingTuesday, and particularly on the day itself, we believe it’s even more important to share where #GivingTuesday dollars will go.

Let’s face it. Whether they’re investing in a product, service, or a cause, “smart” consumers, having ready means to do so via their “smart” devices, gather whatever information they require before they hit the online “checkout”, “purchase” or “donate” button. Your job is to make prospective donor’s research jobs easier by:

• Including in social media posts examples of how #GivingTuesday donations will be spent
  • “Just a $50 donation will ensure three children receive new, warm winter jackets.”
  • “It only takes a $10 donation for us to provide a one-hour counseling session.”
  • “Every $200 we receive, means five more people have a bed on a cold winter night.”
  • “Your $60 donation will help send one low-income child to camp.”

• Launching a website page dedicated to #GivingTuesday that details how donation $ will be spent
• Through “call-out boxes”, headers, or footers, or other means, highlighting in your printed or e-communications, i.e., letters, flyers, e-newsletters, or e-mail blasts, where donations will go
• Creating and sharing an “elevator pitch” for use by all organization employees, regardless of role, so they can readily answer when asked, “what do you do with all your #GivingTuesday donations?”

The bottom line. The more frequently you communicate with prospective donors about where dollars will go, the more the size and number of #GivingTuesday donations you receive will be grow!

We have extended the Giveaway through this Wednesday!

Individuals and organizations can nominate a non-profit to be entered in our giveaway contest by mentioning them (using @(username)) and us in a Twitter post that uses this format:

We’re nominating @HistoricNE for entry in @VivWebSolutions’ #GivingTuesday #socialmedia package giveaway because they keep NE history alive!

@HistoricNE is my favorite #npo so we’re nominating them for entry in @VivWebSolutions’ #GivingTuesday #socialmedia giveaway because they keep NE history alive!

Non-profit organizations can self-nominate/enter our giveaway contest directly by following us on Twitter and retweeting one of our Twitter posts that instructs them to do just that, such as the one below:

RT and follow us to be entered in our #GivingTuesday #socialmedia package giveaway for #nonprofits #NPOs

#GIVINGTUESDAY SOCIAL MEDIA PACKAGE GIVEAWAY

The giveaway includes:

• Kick off with a 1.5-hour in-person discussion at our Boston office regarding winner’s challenges and opportunities related to either implementing a #GivingTuesday social media campaign or a year-end donation campaign
• Campaign branding images. Development by us of up to three images (art files including copy) to be employed easily by winner, as they deem fit, in social media posts and in other marketing vehicles, such as a newsletter, website, or letterhead, and development of up to two branded/design templates, such as letterhead or e-newsletter for use by winner related to #GivingTuesday (4-5 hours of design time)
• Social media plan to be followed by winner to optimize #GivingTuesday success, developed by our Senior social media strategist  (4-5 Hour Strategist time)

Two options:

A) For a #GivingTuesday social media campaign, representative(s) from the winning organization should be available to meet during the week of November 6, 2017.

B) For year-end donation campaign, representative(s) from winning organization should be available to meet by December 1, 2017.

Estimated value of the above:  Over $1,000
One winner to be randomly selected and announced on Monday, November 6, 2017.*

_______________

You will work with

Kalman Gacs
Creative Director, Viv Web Solutions

Kalman has five years experience as a print graphic designer and five years designing branding for websites, many of which were spent partnering with successful nonprofits. Kalman’s work in supporting graphics for your campaign will put you on a great path to have an inspiring and stylish campaign launch.

Gail Snow Moraski
Senior Social Media Strategist Partner

Our Partner has deep experience in both the for-profit and non-profit worlds — helping small to large organizations meet their marketing and communications objectives.  She runs her own marketing consulting firm Results Communications and Research, and loves to deep dive into the analytics as well as strategy of marketing and development/fundraising campaigns.

_______________

Entrant and Winner Criteria

• Winner must be a non-profit organization, headquartered in New England, who can provide documentation of 501(c)3 or other non-profit status. Winner must be amenable to our sharing their “win” via social media as well as samples of the work we create for them as part of their social media package.
• For an organization to be included as an entrant in our giveaway contest, the two types of “entry” Twitter posts outlined at the top of this blog post must be tweeted/retweeted between October 28 and November 5, 2017. Organizations can only enter themselves once in our contest by retweeting one of our “RT and follow” posts. Individuals and organizations can only nominate a particular organization once by mentioning them in one “nominating” post. However, individuals and organizations may nominate as many organizations as they would like via separate “nominating” posts.
• We also hold the right to eliminate nonprofits whose values (Justice, Equity, Sustainability) differ from ours greatly.

*We hold the right to cancel the contest, for any reason  (especially if there are under 15 entrants)

Giveaway Update/Extension:

You asked for ways to enter our #GivingTuesday social media package giveaway via platforms beyond Twitter, so we’ve extended our contest to Nov. 8 to allow you to do so. Individuals and organizations can now enter via LinkedIn or Facebook. Simply enter in the comments, below the relevant LinkedIn or Facebook post, the name of the non-profit organization you would like to nominate for the giveaway. You can also continue to enter via Twitter, as outlined below.

Jane: It seems to me that “Discovery” means different things to different people. So from your point of view, as a web designer, what is the discovery process?

Kalman Gacs: It can mean a lot of things and there are a couple components to it. First of all, it’s understanding the client’s goals. You can’t design an effective website, especially a marketing website, without really understanding what the goals are.

For one, it’s the audiences. You have to understand who the audiences of the website are, and then what goals the client has for each of those audiences. So in some cases it can be very straightforward, but if you don’t make sure that you’re asking the right questions, you can easily miss or misunderstand some audience type. Then that audience isn’t finding what they’re looking for on the website, or not finding a tone that is appealing.
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