Wayne Elsey

Tony Morgan is a young leader with some great ideas. (You really need to follow his blog.) He recently posted The Right Task vs. The Right Person. Tony carefully outlines the difference between hiring someone to accomplish a specific task rather than a strategic goal. The most important thing he brings to light is the end result you achieve when you focus on a task instead of a strategic goal.

A task is a specific action that produces a time-tested response. We know this because tasks are predictable.

A strategic goal is more of an idea, a new reality. It is much less defined and forces the individual to rely on a combination of knowledge, experience, and intuition.

I think the tragedy of task-driven organizations is much deeper and broader than can be found in hiring practices alone. Organizations that attempt to eliminate risk stop creating and start producing. It’s a subtle shift that takes place over time. Most people within the organization never know anything has changed. Most people outside the organization can spot this change from miles away.

I’ve always lived with a sense that I could do better and achieve more than what I was doing or had achieved at any given time. It is one of the main reasons I believe that created the opportunity to step out of corporate life and start a non-profit organization during the peak of my career.

I have worked hard to build a focus on strategic goals rather than tasks in many different ways. For example, I have banned yellow notes from our offices. (I find contraband every now and then.) Yellow notes do nothing other than cost me money and delay action. I don’t want to be so focused on tasks that I miss creating the reality embodied by a particular strategic goal.

At Soles4Souls:

We don’t use yellow notes. (If something needs to be done, we do it!)
We always stop to talk to or interact with a donor. (They are the reason we are here.)
We never transfer someone to voice mail. (People want to talk to people.)

Task-driven organizations are about building to spec. Strategic goal-driven organizations are about creating something new, unique, and custom. Guess which one makes a lasting impression (and a measurable difference)?

Are you leading an organization that values tasks or strategic goals?

I enjoyed reading What every nonprofit should know about marketing. The focus of the post is Kivi Leroux Miller’s new book, The Nonprofit Marketing Guide. The three ideas outlined in the post are:

1. Tell stories.
2. Lose the jargon.
3. There is no such thing as the general public.

Marketing is a vital aspect of organizational sustainability. I’d like to expand on these three ideas and add one more.

1. Tell better stories about “them.” The biggest mistake a nonprofit can make is to talk about themselves. It’s not about you, never has been, and never will be. I want Soles4Souls to be thought of as an organization that helped someone else change the world. The other side of this coin is that we need to keep the focus not only on the donor but on the people who are most likely to receive the greatest benefit from our work. Stories connect us as humans. Pain and suffering are not bound by language or geography. Stories, then, become the fuel that keeps the sense of urgency ever present and offers donors are chance to spread such urgency through conversation with others.

2. Lose the internal jargon. Starbucks, In-N-Out, and Waffle House are great examples of organizations that have their own language. It was created in-house and intended to be used in-house. If you want to communicate in their house, then you’ll have to learn their language. While this may work for a select few businesses, it fails miserably when practiced in the nonprofit context. If I tell a great story that inspires someone to get involved, it’s my job to make it easy and comfortable for them to do so. That means using language and habits that are commonly understood and offering ways to respond that are easy to navigate.

3. There is no such thing as the general public, and there is no such thing as “every person is a prospect.” It’s important for us to understand who is most likely to identify with our work, get involved, and help us increase our capacity through regular, consistent funding. Too many nonprofits believe everyone is a prospect. I don’t. It’s not practical or realistic. Know your audience and communicate in ways and with messages that are comfortable for them. While I want to see everyone get off the couch and do something to make the world a better place, I know that doesn’t mean everyone is going to get involved with our organization.

4. Do something worth talking about. We’ve distributed more than 10 million pairs of shoes to people in need. We are giving away one pair or shoes every nine seconds and are committed to achieving one pair of shoes given away every second. These are measurable goals that are worth talking about. There has to be substance to the work a nonprofit does. People are skeptical, and there is a great deal of competing organizations and causes. Doing something that’s measurable becomes the source of stories that compel others to action, ensures jargon doesn’t cast a shadow over the need to connect with people who may not be familiar with our organization or work, and defines those who will join us or simply give us a nod of approval and move on to something else.

Marketing is a science, but it’s not rocket science. The key is to remember that marketing only works if there is truly a cause or organization worth talking about. All the money and marketing expertise in the world can’t sustain an organization that has created more of an illusion than achieved a measurable impact.

What have you learned about nonprofit marketing? What has been your biggest surprise or success?

I hear a lot of nonprofit leaders talking about awareness campaigns. I even remember hearing this among marketers in the footwear industry. There is a common assumption that if people just know the “who” and the “what” of an organization, cause, or business, then they will instantly become donors, activists, or customers. Wrong!

We’ve had countless opportunities to host headline events at Soles4Souls. I’m skeptical each time someone tells me we can build awareness through this or that because I know it’s probably going to cost me a lot of money with little to show for it in the end. There is a blind trust that if we just focused on building awareness, then “everything else” will take care of itself. I just don’t buy it.

Awareness doesn’t generate contributions.
Awareness doesn’t inspire social change.
Awareness doesn’t motivate people to action.

Seth Godin talks about this in Fans, participants, and spectators. He says, “If all you’re doing is increasing the number of digital spectators, you’re unlikely to earn the conversion rate you deserve.” Seth is absolutely right!

Instead of awareness, I look for engagement. I want people to do more than interact with our work at Soles4Souls from a distance. I want people to know more about us than we sponsored a special event or a concert. At the end of the day, I gain very little from achieving awareness. Where we see the greatest results is when people participate in our service trips, host shoe drives, and purchase from like-minded businesses in the footwear industry.

Awareness creates more spectators, and spectators rarely get in the game or even stay plugged in for very long. Engagement represents a sense of ownership and commitment on behalf of an individual that becomes the fabric of a lasting relationship and long-term results.

Which one do you think is of greater value: awareness or engagement?