Get In the Spirit for the HoBOOken 5k

Normally, any reference to working out is saved strictly for my blog Pasta & Power Squats: A Girl Burns Up the Gym & the Kitchen but since this group is raising money for the Hoboken Shelter, I'll give them a quick shout out - the Hoboken Elysianettes.  Once again, this year, they are organizing, running, and greatly helping out the Hoboken Shelter by donating the proceeds from the HoBOOken 5k to the organization.  I went to their sprint workout last night, Thursday, to get some company and speed during what could be a very boring activity by yourself, 6 hill repeats, but having a few other people running up the same hill felt great. 

Last year at this time, after the Elysianettes approached us about the race, we were deciding whether or not to host our summer/fall happy hour and ultimately decided to host it as a launch party for the HoBOOken 5k. The Elysianettes and some non-running friends come out one month before the event and we enjoyed the chance to get to know them before race and raised $600.  Amazingly they raised more than $25,000 at the race, which despite the weather, was a great day. 

On October 3, 2012 from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m, we'll host our Second Launch Party for the HoBOOken 5k to "Get in the Spirit" at the Melting Pot Hoboken, 100 Sinatra Drive. 

In close vicinity to Pier A and the Path. The Melting Pot will offer complimentary dessert fondue as well as the following drink specials:

$5 draft beer (excluding Chimay)

$6 cocktails from our cocktail menu

I provided a link to the cocktail menu - I am thinking the pom martini but we'll see. The full menu will be out and available for order. Should you want to make it a night out, head over to the restaurant and the Melting Pot will offer meal package of Cheese Fondue, Chocolate Fondue, and a glass of house wine each for $40 per couple. If it's a nice night, bring pup, sit on the patio and they can enjoy K9-friendly white chocolate fondue and treats while you enjoy the meal package.  Available from 5-9 p.m.  

We ask for a suggested donation of $20 and with that you'll receive 3 raffle tickets, with a chance to win a Melting Pot g.c., Fleet Feet Sports g.c., as well as g.c. to other Hoboken hot spots. 

We look forward to seeing you there.  Thanks to the Elysianettes for their hard work to get Hoboken's  homeless back on their feet. Every night the Shelter feeds more than 400 people and shelters 50 of our homeless neighbors. 

#GetintheSpirit - follow kar002 on twitter

My friend Jen and I in 2011 - loving life and hot chocolate after a long cold run, props to Eileen for making the cocoa. 

Make it or Break it: Taglines For Events

Expert nonprofit marketer Nancy Schwartz whose website Getting Attention! has been super informative as I did/do more nonprofit marketing at organizations like Planned Parenthood, the Hoboken Shelter, and PBN.

I've been reading (read skimming) the emails about her 2012 Nonprofit Tagline Awards, and winners have now been selected from over 1,400 entries.  Today, I had some time to take a look at the finalists and some of them were really creative. It got my brain jogging about our fundraising and events and the messaging we use. I think I (or we) always thought a great deal about taglines for the  organizational and program use but not as much about taglines specifically for fundraising and for special events. But since we as fundraisers want to inspire people to attend/give, we probably need messaging here more than anywhere else.

Here are some of the taglines I have used recently for our events at the Hoboken Shelter (this is where I do most events)...

For our 30th Anniversary, our invite cover was a house made up of pictures of guests and we used a line that the women's group had stenciled above the door, "May all who enter as guests, leave as friends." And we invited our family of supporters to celebrate the community we'd created for our homeless neighbors.

In just a few weeks we'll host our second launch party to kickoff a 5K race put on by the Hoboken Elysianettes called the HoBOOken 5K, held Halloween weekend, that benefits the Shelter. When I was doing the invite, I was trying to come up with a cute and not overused tagline connected to running or Halloween.  I eventually gravitated to Halloween and the launch party is a "Get in the Spirit" Wine and Chocolate event to kickoff the 5K.  The flier invites all ghouls, gals, runners and non-runners.

Lastly, in terms of event messaging, the Teak Silent Auction, which is one of our biggest fundraisers and typically brings in $15,000 to $20,000.  I was nominated for the Marketing and Public Relations Chair because of the work I've done with the press, marketing and social media.  I started playing with taglines.  I don't believe we've ever used one, but since I was inspired...
"The Teak Silent Auction: Come to Bid, Stay to Strengthen our Community."

This was a 5 minute experiment...thoughts?  Thanks to Nancy for getting everyone to think about messaging.  As the end of the year comes in we should think about how we talk about ourselves and our messaging and not miss good opportunities to get across what we do.

Newsletter for the Hoboken Shelter

I've talked a lot about the note we put with the Hoboken Shelter's August newsletter in prior posts.  I just posted it as a note on Facebook and I am hoping people appreciate the time we put into sending a little note along. It was no easy task combining a thank you, with an ask and tying it in the newsletter.  And it was a delicate discussion as to whether or not we should ask supporters for money via the mail aside from at the holidays. (I was a 'yes' vote).  I am already noting places I think we could improve and getting ideas for the holiday mailing to share with the committee and E.D. but I think overall it's great we started including a somewhat personalized note to send with the mailing. My mom thought it was nice when she received it. 

The reason I thought the note was important is because the newsletter is the only mailing going to donors they are not receiving "asks" also throughout the year in addition to the newsletter.  They typically sent a letter at the holidays and that was it.  This was on a third of an 81/2x11 sheet and fit just over the newsletter in a number 10 envelope.  Again, because it had stats, thanked the donor, shared with the donor what the community accomplished, referenced a successful client and made an ask I think it is a successful round 1 attempt.

Here is the text we came up with that went out as part of the August newsletter...


Dear Friends,

I want to take a moment to say THANK YOU!

It is because of your generosity that 76 guests have moved into their own homes and 78,041 meals have been served so far this year. I am sincerely grateful for your dedication to our important work.

Your gift truly make a difference in the lives of our guests. In the newsletter you'll meet a lovely women named Yvette, who is a successfully housed guest. She worked her whole life  to take of her family and other people's families, but then found herself out of work and homeless. Thanks to our caring community, you helped us get her back on her feet and now she has keys to her own home!

Every day guests like Yvette count on us for food and shelter. Without your support, we could not continue to open our doors to our homeless neighbors on their journeys to homes of their own. I hope you'll consider a gift to support our life-changing work. 

Your support is critical to moving our homeless neighbors from the streets to our shelter to their own homes. With your help, I know we can end homelessness one person at a time. Thank you!

Sincerely,

Jaclyn Cherubini, MPA
Executive Director

Policy and Positioning: Game, Set, Match (Cecile Richards at the DNC)

I must admit that I did not watch any of the coverage of the RNC 2012.  I realize that I should be more politically-minded prior to making such a big decision but I had a few reasons not to watch.

1. I already am 100% sure which way I am voting.
2. I hate to get all riled up before bed.
3. There was an NCIS marathon.

I had not intended to watch any of the DNC 2012 (just to be fair) but the promise of Cecile Richards, Sandra Fluke, and most importantly the Foo Fighters had me at hello.

Cecile Richards spoke Tuesday night and gave, in my opinion, a great speech. During the following commentary, I realized not only was it great because I believed in what Cecile said but because she'd set everything up perfectly.  She gave the facts, she gave the human touch, she incited a little fear, and she rallied us at the end. There were some great takeaways in her speech for us fundraisers as authors of marketing materials and donor communications.

Cecile was introduced by Libby Bruce, a PP patient and supporter who spoke of the great care she received as a patient.  During her speech Cecile spoke about policy but she humanized the policy by referring to Libby and the stories of several other patients who were in need of the services offered by this organization.

As mentioned, after she spoke and they went to commentary the CNN folks said that Cecile had perfect set up in her speech (light bulb for me). The commentator said she spoke about the policies and politics and she humanized it by positioning the organization with stories about the real people in need of real services. I also thought she gave a strong call to action to get out and vote in terms of the positioning. You can see Cecile Richards speech here.

The way Cecile and the organization garner support for PP through her speeches, emails, and mailings is full of this aspect of policy and positioning.  It's a great method for communicating what they do.  And it's great for any organization.

I recently wrote about the Shelter's inclusion of a note within the August newsletter.  What Cecile did in her speech is what I had hoped to achieve with the note - that balance of information and humanizing the issue.  I wanted people to know the hard numbers, what we'd been doing, and what we had yet to do but also to hear about the real people who were, with the help of this organization, getting keys to open their doors. Then we make the ask - the call to action. 

There was a lot we could take away as good fundraisers from watching the conventions, particularly about how we communicate. I think, for me, though while Clinton and Michelle gave excellent speeches and many others rallied the crowd tremendously, Cecile's speech stood out for me because it reinforced many of the good direct mail/communications concepts I learned at PP. 

To look at the specifics - this is one paragraph from her speech, which states the policies that have come about this year but also puts a little bit of fear into her audience.
"Two years ago, when John Boehner, Paul Ryan, Todd Akin and the Tea Party took control of the House of Representatives, they promised to create jobs and jump-start the economy. But, instead, on day one, they came after women's health. And they haven't let up since. They voted to end cancer screenings and well-woman visits for five million women, end funding for birth control at Planned Parenthood, and for good measure, they even tried to redefine rape. And now, Mitt Romney is campaigning to get rid of Planned Parenthood and overturn Roe v. Wade. This year women learned that if we aren't at the table, we're on the menu. So this November, women are organizing, mobilizing and voting for the leaders who fight for us."

Now the humanizing aspect.
"Women like Libby Bruce, the patient you just heard from. Women like Brandi McCay, a 27 year-old whose stage two breast cancer was caught at a Planned Parenthood health center. She is now cancer-free. Or the woman who went on Facebook, after Paul Ryan voted to defund Planned Parenthood, and posted, "I guess they don't understand that us military wives go to Planned Parenthood when the doctor on base can't see us.""

And the call to action...

"So, this November, we're going to keep moving forward, and we are going to re-elect President Obama."

Game, Set, Match, Great Job Cecile!

Cultivation & Engagement: Beginning A Strategy

I have been volunteering for the Hoboken Shelter for the past two years in a development capacity and it has been a great pleasure to help and advise them on putting their donor information on paper and track it, create concrete and initiatives as well as an operational plan, and develop communication/new media efforts.

One of the initiatives was to implement a strategy for donor cultivation and engagement as well as tracking.  This required the help of volunteers and board because the E.D. is incredibly knowledgeable about donors but also always time crunched.  I mentioned in a previous post that we were holding an upcoming meeting where we could discuss our top donors/supporters.  We pulled together a small group to discuss how to engage and cultivate donors.  We chose this small group because they were interested in doing cultivation and engagement rather than just events, they knew many of the supporters and we thought the group would be manageable and would help us keep on top of sensitive donor information. 

I plan to keep a log of how our strategy proceeds to share with others who may be unsure of how to make the leap to cultivation and engagement with a bare bones staff.  We've taken the steps to:

1. Go through a list of high-level donors and identify donors who've given recently and we don't know why or who they are and donors who've been giving regularly but we've not taken the opportunity to get to know. Now we just need to narrow down the list. We had about 40 people who were highlighted.

2. Create a Donor Contact Report. We will put all donor information in a database but additional we'll prepare background on donors (much of which is in the E.D. head) inc. employment, education, hobbies, affiliations, foundations, assets, partner and family information, why they give to us, as well as the results of any meetings and what the next steps are.

3. We identified an initial approach to talk to our donors about how their donation was used and find out why they give to Shelter as well as talking with them about the Shelter's future and what programs they know about as the Shelter turns 30 this year.

4. Identified ways to thank our donors and cultivate and engage them:  cultivation events, friend-raisers and in-home parties, newsletters, invitations to special events, personalized notes, etc.

5. Agreed to hold a next meeting to begin to discuss the narrowed down list and start to find out what we know about our donors and plan who will make initial contact.

This is all very exciting and will hopefully mean that more donors feel a part of a family of donors who are well aware of where their dollars are going and will help rally more people to give. 

New Facebook Page Cover Image for the Shelter

Last week I made a change to the Shelter's cover image on Facebook. I wanted to share what I had done.

I slightly "stole" the idea from images I saw used by other shelters/food pantries nationwide.  If I had a number one piece of advice for learning social media - it would be follow your friends and follow your enemies. I had meant to update the cover image after the event but never quite seemed to find the time until now. I would like to identify more images we can use for the Shelter in the future and definitely want to check and make sure they have a digital camera at their disposal.  I don't think we (or anyone else) need anything to fancy.  I think some images can be simple. I had asked Jaclyn (who probably thought I was nuts - trust is a wonderful thing though and I love her for it) for images of food piled up and she said she had tons of bread. We have been finding ways to thank donors since our May event and I thought this was another good way.

What are some good images you've used and do you feel it's important to rotate the cover image on your page?

Tri Point Support: Year End Already?

Sometimes it's great to get a reminder about a task.  As a fundraiser, you wear so many hats it's often hard to remember what foot is going in front of the other.  (Especially not good for someone who is also a runner - albeit a slow one). 

I just got the email from Amy Eisenstein regarding year end fundraising. My first thought was, "is it really that time?"  But really, it is.  We've already started a conversation as to how we'll approach year-end giving but it may be time to kick it into high-gear. Fortunately, it seems we are on the right track with our brainstorming. Also, read Amy's post - she and it are fabulous.

1.  Get in touch with donors:  Our upcoming meeting is a great time for us to identify our donors and start a conversation, tell them where they investments in the organization went this year and remind them about upcoming fundraising goals.

2.  The letter:  The Shelter sends out three newsletters each year as their only snail mail communications with donors.  Prior to this past newsletter, the only newsletter accompanied by a note or letter was end of year giving. They are pretty committed to this type of communication; however I got them to agree to put a note in the summer newsletter and we'll see how that plays out.  It had stats on how many people served to date, referenced a story in the newsletter about a client and told a little about her, and made an ask directly. And it said thanks in advance.  We have already started talking about gathering client stories, pictures, and more for the winter newsletter. Our last meeting we talked about a particular volunteer we'd like to highlight for the newsletter.  I think a few more testimonials couldn't hurt and some great stats.

3. Online: I usually don't donate to them online; however I donate everywhere else online.  I think this means their website could use some work and are we featuring the donate now in EOY emails?  That's usually when I get reminded to donate to my favorite organizations. I like things to land in my inbox. I am certainly an advocate for emails on the 27, 29, 31 or some combination of dates.

4. Social Media: I had spoken with one of the chairs of our holiday event about upping our holiday exposure via social media by collecting stories on Facebook about volunteering at the holidays. More than 400 residents from near and far gather at various holidays from Nov-Dec to help the  Shelter and we should be sharing their stories and getting some great photos. We should also see if we can get the video of Buddy of Carlo's Bakery online to repost. His popularity is certainly not waning. There had been talk of creating a video and if we cannot get a video done from an outside source I think we should do a rough cut video created with my mac to show pictures and what funding has done this year. I also think we need to have pictures taken at the holidays so we can post immediately to tell funders their dollars feed people and maybe a new picture for our Facebook page with people eating at Thanksgiving that says "thanks be to all." 

5. Tooting our Horn:  We'll have to make sure we share our stats in the newsletter.  I stated some ways to toot our horn via Facebook and video. We'll be having a holiday fundraiser, which would be a great place to share a mission centered video.  We'll be doing press releases leading up to that but we can do a post release on all we accomplished - we have some pretty great press contacts.

Unique ideas (off the top of my head):

• For our 30th event in May we created little cards (3x5) with our donation needs - perhaps we can have those reprinted with our statistics. 
• The ED is such an ever-present face for the Shelter - it might be nice to do a EOY video with her thanking the community and asking for their support, which we could also use as a press release. 

If anything else pops up in this tired ol' brain I'll be sure to post it.  I also plan to post a copy of the note we worked on that I mentioned above.