Nobody likes to be labeled, so stop using them.

A recent project at 501creative reminded me how resistant we are to labels. We are working with an organization that provides volunteer, fitness and learning opportunities for adults over 65. The organization, Oasis, has a generic name that needs some supporting messaging to explain who the organization serves.

We all thought...65 and over, aren't those seniors? Guess what, no one in that age group likes the name senior.

Millennials hate being called millennials. Seniors hate senior. No one likes a label, mostly because older or younger generations use those labels to disparage. Once someone refers to you as a label, you want to dispute that label. How dare someone define me so easily and rapidly?

I am a GenXer. We are the angry, sullen put-upon middle child of generational labels. We never get the attention we think we deserve. And yet that is not more true than the lazy, needy millennial.

Every generation below us is doing it wrong. Every generation above us screwed it all up somehow.

Labels are lazy, useless and just plain wrong.  Labels are usually not accurate, rob us of our humanity and complexity, and are usually used to belittle others to make us feel better about ourselves.

So how do we say senior without saying senior? Older adult? Retired person?

Let's think in outcomes. What do we want to have happen? For Oasis, we added the words, Lifelong Adventure as a tagline. We pitched the line, "It is your time for a lifelong adventure." Ad copy talks about enjoying life after kids are grown and work is done. This says, hey you are a senior, instead of saying senior or older adult (words guaranteed to make someone in that generation bristle).

Be wary of appealing to specific generational audiences and appeal to outcomes. What do people want? How can you help them achieve that? What values do you share? Ditching labels and treating people as human beings is the first step to building stronger relationships.

Other labels are not helpful too. Cougar is one that comes to mind. It is predatory and assumes older women are desperate to stay relevant and overly-needy. Men who date younger women have no label.
Helicopter parent. Militant. Poor. Slut. Crazy. Plus-sized. None of these labels accurately describe someone and even worse, compound already sexist, racist and classist ideas in our society.
Stop trying to appeal to millennials or baby boomers. Try appealing to what people want out of their lives and how your organization can help them achieve that.

Silence says so much

Last week, my friends Pamela and Crystal witnessed their worst nightmare come to life. They saw the video, as most of us did, of the behavioral therapist and his autistic client in Miami being confronted and shot at by police. Being sisters of an older brother with autism and a family of color, it was jarring site to say the least. Their greatest fear is that their brother's actions will be misinterpreted as violent, difficult or noncompliant when dealing with authority such as police.

They were shocked a second time when they looked to Autism Speaks, a leading organization improving the lives of people with autism, to find there was no response to the situation.

The sisters were disappointed Autism Speaks had nothing to say about the situation, and did not stand up for the therapist or his client, or condemn the handling of the situation or call for any kind of change.

The silence says so much.

Now anyone on social media must have seen the video, it was all over the place for a few days. So I am assuming someone at the organization saw it as well. There were probably a lot of reasons why Autism Speaks didn't well, speak. Fear of bringing up racial concerns, fear of seeming that they were anti-police, etc. I wasn't in those meeting rooms, but I can only imagine the conversations. A leading organization advocating for the welfare of people with autism had nothing to say. Not about the dangers of adults with autism in society, whose way of interacting may seem odd or strange, not about what they or anyone else is doing to help law enforcement and others understand the issues and needs of those with autism. Not about what behavioral therapists go through everyday to keep their clients safe. Not about what a hero the therapist was for keeping calm and how he learned those skills, and how they are helping to advocate for the professional development of the therapists, who are the ones who have the most direct care and the least pay. Not about what families can do to ensure their loved ones in group home settings are being kept safe.

What it says to me is that if you want to be a thought leader, if you want to be the trusted resource, the go-to group for your issue, you don't get to pick when you have a thought. Effective leaders lead when it is easy and hard. So this organization, for some reason, thought that they didn't need to comment on a NATIONAL story which was the subject of much conversation. They chose not to be at the table for this. Courageous communication requires us to respond even if it is not our table, not the meal we would have served or the time of day we would have served it. When our country was looking for someone to hold our hand and tell us that it would be okay, that they were working to solve the problem, we heard nothing. These events can be opportunities for us to be a part of the conversation and lead our organizations and our supporters to greater understanding.

What does it take to be a courageous communicator? To be at the table and part of the conversation, even if it is a little or a lot scary?

1. Permission to respond quickly. 
As fast as news breaks, we need to be ready to respond. Going up four levels of approval or getting the lawyer to OK the press release is not how you respond quickly. Leaders at nonprofits need to give their people the trust and latitude to respond to situations soon after they occur with as little red tape as possible.

2. Understand and address the concerns you have to responding.
We don't respond because we feel scared that we will say the wrong thing or be criticized for doing so. We don't want to offend donors with controversial statements. These are valid concerns. As quickly as you can, flush out what the concerns are and how to address them. Weigh this against the cost of saying nothing. Once you address concerns and understand the benefits of being part of the conversation, or leading the conversation, then you can ease the discomfort and speak up.

3. Determine what you are comfortable with saying.
Maybe you are not as brave as you want to be, but saying something is better than saying nothing.

4. Commit to being a thought leader, even when it is hard to do so. 
Organizations often say they want to be thought leaders. They want to be leading the conversation about whatever issue they are working on. There are tremendous benefits to this, which is why we want to be one. We get recognized. It is one of the most effective and least expensive ways to get exposure and generate new supporters. Remember this when the going gets tough. Speaking up gets you the attention you want, especially speaking up at difficult times. If it was easy, everyone would do it. Be a leader, be courageous, even when it is hard.

Get off the attention treadmill

Ah the treadmill. You work hard and go absolutely no where. Sound familiar? If your communications program sounds like a treadmill, let's think about changing your approach so you can start moving forward.

Many years ago, our approach to marketing was "spray and pray." Spread lots of messages, and hope someone sees or hears and responds. It was not very efficient or effective. Who was reading that newsletter? What did our supporters need? Unless they told us, it was hard to know because we couldn't gauge their behaviors.

Today we have so many tools to connect with our supporters. We can see what emails they open, what they forward, read, share, etc. Because of this information, we can hone in on our best prospects.

Our approach needs to shift. We don't need to worry about convincing people of our worth. A common complaint I hear is "No one has ever heard of us." Well, who are those people? Does it matter if they haven't? Are they a likely prospects? Convincing absolutely everyone that your organization is worthy and valuable only to have most of them not become supporters is wasting valuable time, energy and money.

 The approach now is to find like-minded people and be available to them so they are attracted to your organization. Stop running. Stand still and be available and easy to find. This is called inbound marketing. Instead of going outbound, and spreading your message and hope someone responds, we stand tall in our message and make ourselves easy to find, so when people interested in our cause and go looking, there we are! And because they have self-identified as interested, you already know they think you are worthy and valuable.

We all have our own personal philanthropic wheelhouse. I rescue things. It's what I do. It is as hardwired in me as wearing tall shoes. I am not a flats or flip flops girl, and you can't make me. So stop trying. It's not that I don't like them on other people, they are just not for me. Same with my personal mission. I am a rescuer. My kids are adopted from foster care. My family and I have fostered more than 140 dogs for Stray Rescue of St. Louis. If you don't have a home, come find me. It is not that I don't care about aging, or diabetes or addiction, it is just that those causes aren't in my wheelhouse. No amount of pushing, pulling or tugging is going to change that. I am not going to one day just start wearing ballet flats. It's just not going to happen. Your attempts to convince me otherwise is a waste of time and energy.

So instead of trying to convince people your cause is worthy, instead be who you are, strong in message, and easily findable. That means having solid SEO rankings, updating your site, blogging, posting, tweeting and anything else that connects you to those who think like you.

This means looking at some of the ways you spend your money and seeing how well they work. A local private school spent the largest portion of its marketing budget on advertising (outbound marketing, a spray and pray approach), when only 3 percent of families said that the ads were how they learned about the school. The most effective form of marketing was word of mouth from families, friends and coworkers. This is the best example of inbound marketing. The school is now cutting back on ads and encouraging its current families to share stories of the school.

Your qualified prospects for donations, volunteers and programs now can find you, and so you already know they are interested.

It seems weird not to go chasing after prospects. It seems like you are not doing your job. But when you focus on sharing stories of value and interest, being helpful, available and findable, people will respond. It will get you off the treadmill and get you results.

We suck so bad and we can't wait to tell you about it!

Failure. No one wants to admit it. We are bad with money, or food, or whatever. We screw up, we mess up. This is our own personal pain, because everyone else must totally have their crap together right?

They don't. No one does. Darn it, I wish it were true.

In CBT, you don't fix your issues, but work on accepting that you will always have issues.

Mind. Blown.

I went to therapy to get fixed. I want to be confident in myself, have way less FOMO, trust more, be less dependent on what others think, etc.

Guess what, ain't gonna happen. My job is to understand that we all have stuff we are working on, and to accept that I have flaws and always will. It is like Whack-A-Mole. Hit one issue or problem down, another comes up. I thought I was supposed to learn how to keep all of them down.

Yet when we admit our failures, or weaknesses, our losses, we become more human. Our honesty earns respect. We all have them, so when we share them, we are connecting ourselves more deeply to others. (When you are done reading this blog, read this and you will understand the power of sharing your shame.)

Your nonprofit is the same. Admitting what's wrong, saying where you failed, is the bravest thing you can do. And in being brave, you are going to get the attention you want and the loyalty of your supporters that you crave.

What if you produced an annual report about all the ways you screwed up? Engineers Without Borders did this, and it is so cool.  It is different and bold. And I love them for it. Because what happens when we fail? We learn. And we do it better the next time. By telling stories of our failures, we are showing donors we are always learning to do it better. That is a story worth sharing.

Nonprofits are the worst holiday letter ever

So it is May, but let me take you December. Since we have Facebook to portray our perfect and wonderful lives to each other, maybe we don't get the holiday letter as much, but you all know exactly what I am talking about. The "my kids are better than yours, our lives are much busier, productive, happier than yours" letter. We despise them because we know they are not true. NO ONE is that happy or productive. It just reeks of insincerity. We get this on a daily basis with our Facebook friends who just LOVE THEIR KIDS SO MUCH, and their partner is SO DARN WONDERFUL to them blah blah blah.

What really attracts us to others and helps us form real relationships is sharing our whole self. The strengths, the "good enoughs," the stuff we are working on. It gives us our humanity. When we expose our weaknesses, we are stronger for it.

Our holiday letter this year could include how my son failed four classes this year. WHOO HOO what a kid! (My son, my love for you is not based on your GPA or driving record, thank goodness!) See how much more you liked me because I shared something like this. My son is struggling to graduate HIGH SCHOOL. There you go. We love blogs like Scary Mommy because they tell the truth about raising kids. We can relate, it is almost a relief that someone is telling it like it is.

Ya got me?

Okay, let's take this to an organizational level.

If all your nonprofit communications is like a holiday letter, you are coming across as fake. We are awesome, our programs are awesome, our people are awesome. JUST AMAZING. All the time. The messages we pump out are shiny, pretty and polished.

And when we do this, we think we are doing the right thing but it comes across as fake. We think we need to only be positive lest a donor find out we don't succeed at everything and run screaming to the next nonprofit that does. But really, that nonprofit doesn't either. All organizations have successes and failures.

People want us to be straight. Tell the truth. Tell the complicated story. Tell how you tried and failed. When we do this, we look secure and confident in who we are. Donors will love us for our honesty and transparency because donors are human beings (shocking I know) who want a real relationship, just like we all do. When we let the cracks show, we let people in. They trust and respect us more for the courage to share the truth.

Be brave enough to tell the truth about you and your organization.

You know the right way to do things, so why can't you do it?

Big day of beating your head against the wall learning

Last week I spent a lovely day with my friends from CSPRC at the Spectrum conference. It was a fabulous day full of eager nonprofit communication types looking to better themselves, their skills and their organizations. I did a talk on how not to create boring web content. It was fab, of course, but I told my audience something that I totally believe to be true: you are smart and capable and you know darn well what it takes to make compelling web content. So why can't you do it?

The frustration of a conference like this comes from learning a bunch of new stuff, getting all fired up, bringing it to your organization and having it die right there. It is hard to upsell new ideas from within an organization. So I am telling these smart, wonderful folks what they already know. The problem is, they aren't the ones I should be talking to. It's the people NOT in the room who really matter. The exec directs and board members that shy away (or hide in fear) from ever doing anything too controversial interesting.

Truth is, I can teach you how to tell your story better, but if your organization fears change, it is never going to go anywhere. Again, we have the Biggest Loser theory of change. Change behavior to change thinking. And that usually doesn't work. Those new ideas (behaviors) mostly die right there in the front lobby of your office because your organization has the same way of thinking. 

What I want to teach you all is how to upsell a change in thinking. How to convince those in charge that being brave and courageous communicators will attract people to you, not drive them away. That's what we need. I know that my fine counterparts in nonprofits know they need to be interesting, compelling, strong in message, but man oh man how to you convince that buttoned up board that it is okay to do that?

Instead of teaching you how do do things differently, I am going to teach you how to think differently and in turn, how to teach your organization to think differently. This will lead you to put those new ideas in place. Without a shift in thinking, new ideas or ways of doing things are an exercise in frustration.

Why in the world would you read anything I write or believe anything I tell you?

Well I call myself the nonprofit marketing therapist. I think of myself as Stuart Smalley, the old SNL character. I am not a licensed therapist, of course, but I am a member of several 12-step programs!

Actually I have been a branding consultant, coach, teacher and writer for years at my home at 501creative. From this experience, and my experience with cognitive behavioral therapy and behavior change psychology, I have come to understand that teaching people how to communicate better is just treating the symptom. It is the Biggest Loser syndrome. I can put you on a restricted diet and work you out five hours a day, but it doesn't help you understand how you got to 400 pounds in the first place. We are treating behaviors, and thoughts and feelings influence behaviors. So in order to communicate more effectively, we need to change our feelings, which changes our thinking and then changes our behaviors. If we see our organizations as smart, stable, interesting, confident and strong, then we can begin to communicate more effectively. Same as our BL people. If they felt better about themselves, they will probably take better care of themselves. Let's look at the feelings and thinking FIRST, and then the behavior.

So this blog, and the subsequent book, will look at how to change our thinking to be more courageous and bold, and care a lot less about what people think. Believe it or not, some people will love you for that even more.

Imagine if our organizations were people. What would we be like? Would we be confident, capable, interesting, committed? Or would we be tentative, insecure, boring? If we had a friend who needed as much approval and had so many wonderful things to say as our nonprofit, we would hate that person. We are like one braggy holiday letter. Everything is so wonderful. We are so awesome. Please support our awesomeness. 

Real relationships are formed when we are honest and authentic. That means good, bad and everything in between. Donors want to know us, because they are people and they want the truth. We are afraid of showing our truths because we perceive the risks to be too high.

The real risk is being boring and bland is having people underestimate you or look you over completely. This is a competitive world. How can we compete with the cute video of the momma cat who let the orphaned puppy nurse her kittens, or the latest Donald Trump meme or another one of those Delish recipe videos? We need to be that interesting. We can't be that interesting trying to say good stuff all the time. We have to have a point of view, we have to be a part of the conversation. We have to stand for something. 

How to know if your nonprofit is codependent and why that makes your brand boring

Yeah so the blog is still getting its spiffy face on. But I can't wait until then because I have things to say.

Let's look at what codependency means. It means sacrificing your own needs for the needs of others. Simple as that. Those of us in helping professions tend to lean this way by nature. We want to do for others and make the world a better place. I totally get it. The issue is: at what cost? Because if we constantly put others ahead of us, then we will suffer.

Now that makes sense right? Like totally. Put your own mask on before helping others with their breathing mask. Isn't that what the flight attendants tell us? Practicing this though, can be challenging and it can be especially challenging for nonprofits at the organizational level.

We are in relationships with our donors, and these relationships are based on an exchange. We give them something of value and they give us something of value. Our something of value is to work on issues that they don't have the time or money or expertise to be able to handle. I can't rescue EVERY dog, although I would love to try. But Stray Rescue of St. Louis can do a much better job than me. I give them money, they get the dogs. Sometimes the exchange can be hard to see. It is challenging to feel we are on equal footing or to believe we are because we need those dollars so badly. We feel dependent on our donors. We don't always feel like we are in an equal relationship.

This is where the co comes into the dependence.

We tend to sacrifice our own needs for those of others. We want to make everyone happy. This is not a bad thing, for real. It only becomes an issue when we neglect our own needs.

We are terrified of criticism. How many of us held back on social media because we were so afraid of a negative comment? How many of us said no to an interview or to a specific speaker for an event because we thought they might make people mad? Our brands tend to be pretty blah because we want to please everyone. When we do this, we stand out to no one.

In cognitive behavior therapy, of which I am a huge proponent, and where the basis for some of these thoughts are coming from, says that praise and criticism are the same thing. How can this be? Well, because we should not need either one to feel good or bad about ourselves. We shouldn't be overly dependent on praise to make us happy and a criticism shouldn't send us over the edge.

Seriously though, I am not immune to criticism. It hurts, I am not denying that.

But we are so afraid of making someone mad or disappointing a donor or whatever that we tend to not take a stand.

A good leader will have a specific point of view and stick to it, though praise and criticism. Not that they are immune to feedback, but they take it and make it work for them, without derailing anything.

When we are so afraid of criticism, it gets in the way of sharing our message, that's codependence. I see it all the time, so if this rings true, you are not alone.

Being strong in your message means understanding who you are as an organization, and then accepting that. You are not going to appeal to everyone. And those people who get upset? Come on, they weren't that on board anyway. Your true supporters want an authentic relationship. You can tell them the good, bad and all in between. They will love you all the more for it.

So in this blog, we are going to explore how organizations become codependent, how they can find their authentic message and how they can use it to engage more supporters and move forward.

I swear. It's true.