Determining ROI on PR Dollars Spent

No matter the size, reach, or history of your particular nonprofit operation or business; determining how effective the money you spend on PR and marketing efforts can be, at times, nearly impossible to gauge. If you are like most nonprofits, you gear your public relations funds-however minimal-towards a percentage that calls upon a wide variety of marketing tools-part web-based, newspaper, tv, events, etc. How do you even begin to determine which method was particularly effective in bringing in funds? We take a look below at the best ways to effectively determine return on investment (ROI) in relation to how much you may spend on PR and marketing.

In most cases, determining your return on investment in regards to marketing, is nearly impossible after the fact-that is, after he funds have been spent and strategy implemented. You may be able to say that it was either successful or a flop, but you have no clear idea on where the money went, and was best spent. This is why it is absolutely crucial to make a plan to analyze your efforts before implementing them. Here are the most effective and popular means of instituting a measurable ROI plan:

Market research: Research online and elsewhere to see what plans and strategies are working for others trying to gauge their marketing ROI. Read up on percentages by company success, individual strategy, and projects or missions of nonprofits with similar objectives.
Start small: Before taking huge financial leaps in pr/marketing efforts without guaranteed return, take a small step to test out the waters. Invest a smaller amount, and see how it works. Was it effective? A smaller investment is also much easier to gauge.
Watch your budget: Obviously, if you are involved in a nonprofit, you the importance of watching your budget, but do you allocate a set amount and watch that you do not over reach this amount? Many nonprofits know a rough sketch of what they can afford and stay within a particular range; but knowing specific numbers and documenting them, will give you an answer when it comes to evaluating which projects and pr goals were effective. Most importantly, having a fine-tuned, project-specific, budget will give you the answers you need when you start analyzing your ROI in relation to pr dollars spent.
Set only measurable goals and objectives: Instead of hoping that a certain pr tactic will get you a sizeable amount of return, devise a measurable plan of numbers, amounts, and dollars spent. This way, you have a clear cut goal in mind to achieve, as well as a more focused idea of your gains and losses in the short and long term.

Have more specifics on determining ROI for your nonprofit dollars spent? Please share your best stories on lessons learned in marketing the important mission of your nonprofit business.
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Mark Buzan is Principal and Chief Magnifier in Action Strategies, a full service Strategic Communications, Public Relations and Public Affairs Consultancy for non-profits and associations. Make sure to contact him for advice on reaching audiences you may or may not have yet considered in your marketing communications and PR campaigns. Drop him a line if you are looking for help in developing a public relations campaign. You can view his website at www.actionstrategies.ca.

Tips for building a non-profit's email campaign list

I recently came across a great article non-profits abound need to consider in building their email outreach efforts. Take a look and let me know your thoughts:

A Little Something Extra
Mailing list incentives can be used by all organizations
by Ron Cates, Constant Contact Development Director, Southwest Region

We'd all like to think that all it takes to get someone interested in learning more about a nonprofit or another organization is a charitable nature. But sometimes it takes more than that to entice someone to join your mailing list or become a supporter.

Of course, when you don't sell something tangible -- products or food, for example -- you can't offer a two-for-one special or a percentage off. The good news is that even if you're a service business, there are ways to build your mailing list by offering something extra to a potential subscriber.

In the nonprofit world

For many nonprofits, the idea of giving something away for free runs counter to the mission of the organization, especially if someone hasn't yet made a donation. But so few nonprofits use an incentive to reach people that an organization that takes this route could easily differentiate itself.

One suggestion is to offer an item with your organization's logo on it for anyone who signs up for your mailing list -- a t-shirt, tote bag, hat, or something similar. This allows your organization's cause to be exposed to more people, and offers relatively low-cost promotion in places you may not be. After all, a nonprofit's goal is to raise money, and you can't do that without first raising awareness.

Another way to differentiate yourself is to offer a benefit to signing up. For example, hosting an event and only allowing email list members to get in, or finding a partner to match donations and saying you have to be on the mailing list for that to happen. If you're a membership-driven organization, like a YMCA, you could offer a free month or a discounted rate when people also supply their email address. You may find that these subscribers will waive the discount anyway because they want to support the group's mission.

Whatever you do, you don't want to dilute the mission of your organization, so you always want to bring it back to that. You also don't want to sound overtly commercial. In the messaging itself, talk about your mission: yes, you're going to send fundraising requests, but all the proceeds will go toward helping people with arthritis, for example.

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Mark Buzan is Principal and Chief Magnifier in Action Strategies, a full service Strategic Communications, Public Relations and Public Affairs Consultancy for non-profits and associations. Make sure to contact him for advice on reaching audiences you may or may not have yet considered in your marketing communications and PR campaigns. Drop him a line if you are looking for help in developing a public relations campaign. You can view his website at www.actionstrategies.ca.

How the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants benefitted from market research in their communications

Case study

My recent blog article on the importance of market research for non-profits pointed to the value of getting to the heart of what their supporters are motivated by and most importantly, the means of communications they prefer to receive. Normally, I spout off about the importance of this or that :) However, it's come to me that perhaps an example is needed. I've even decided that I'm going to begin making a regular spotting of examples from here on in. So here goes:

The Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI) serves as an umbrella organization for a network of 190 immigrant agencies in Ontario. Action Strategies was engaged to develop a new marketing strategy for its main online service, Settlement.org.

Launched in 2000, Settlement.Org has employed a variety of marketing methods including transit ads, media buys, link exchanges, articles, e-newsletters, site demos, and conference and trade shows.  Unfortunately, OCASI staff and board were not finding that Settlement.Org was reaching its full potential. They were are also looking to improve their ability to analyze and evaluate the results of their marketing efforts. Action Strategies was engaged to conduct a marketing evaluation and create a plan that would guide the organization for the following 3 to 5 years.

As a result of the audit and review, the agency has been able to bring significant efficiencies to their regular marketing efforts and after better understanding their clientele, staff have been able to make a strong argument for re-centering the focus of Settlement.Org’s brand.

So it goes to show you...doing your homework pays off! Let me know your thoughts. What has been your experience? ____________________
Mark Buzan is Principal and Chief Magnifier in Action Strategies, a full service Strategic Communications, Public Relations and Public Affairs Consultancy for non-profits and associations. Make sure to contact him for advice on reaching audiences you may or may not have yet considered in your marketing communications and PR campaigns. Drop him a line if you are looking for help in developing a public relations campaign. You can view his website at www.actionstrategies.ca.

The value of polling & surveys in delivering high quality communications

Keeping abreast of the needs and wants of your membership, donors, and potential supporters is vital to a non-profit’s objectives and overall success. Ensuring that you are providing exactly what your audiences want, can seem like a never-ending battle but in fact, it's the life blood of build effective communication.

While most NPO (non-profit organization) staff are in touch with their members and supporters, the temptation to assume they know what they want needs to be resisted. Without truly understanding your supporters and evaluating the efforts to reach them, more time is spent on generic marketing with often withered results. Consequently, as you may have guessed, is a mixed bag of results. Without measuring marketing and advocacy efforts, non-profits throw money and time out the window.

The Case for Polling/ Surveys

Market research is essential in ensuring that your message is effectively targeted to the targets you are trying to reach. With a plethora of media for dissemination of key messages, it is imperative to sustain your advocacy efforts by thinking with a clear line towards understanding what motivates your audiences and stakeholders. Strategic communication planning begins with a concrete foundation of audience research, and then effectively applies that research to targeted messaging.

So, the obvious question is: how do I effectively measure my marketing efforts? How do I know if the messages are inspiring my membership to act, interact, or donate? By knowing exactly, what it is your audiences are looking for on a majority level, you can provide it; and re-strategize your advocacy plans accordingly.

Here are some of the best ways and tips for analyzing your PR and marketing efforts for the future success of your organization.

1. Polling/ Surveys: One of the most obvious answers is polling/ surveying your members, donors or target audiences. But how do you best go about that? Though many people are too busy to leave feedback and comments for a service or program, if you approach them in the correct way, they will be more likely to do so. One good way is to ask for feedback and comments on your email notices and newsletters. Another is to address them from your website for general or specific feedback.

2. Specific and General Feedback: Make sure when reaching out to your membership that you ask for both general feedback as well as specific. For example, if you are trying to determine if a specific program is effective in generating support, ask a specific question to that end. If, on the contrary, you are just beginning to gather responses on your business, ask for general feedback. Depending on the general response of this collection, you’ll see a pattern in the elements that your membership like and dislike about your organization.

3. Just Ask: Simply asking your membership at programs, events, and the like; can garnish a lot more information that you might expect. Not only does it make your customers feel like their opinion matters and that they are part of your organization’s mission, but it also gives them the opportunity to candidly express their opinions on general and specific matters at your nonprofit. Remember it is vital that non-profit and association executives keep their finger on the pulse of their organization. The best way to do this is through face-to-face networking.

4. Record: Most importantly, do not think that you can keep a running memory bank on all the different feedback you receive. With all the short and long term happenings of a non-profit, it is impossible to keep every opinion coherent and unblemished in your mind. Find a way to effectively record these responses. This can as simple and as cost-free as a variety of excel spreadsheets on your laptop.

5. Analyze: It should go without saying, finding a set time and manner to analyze all these results is just as important as collecting the information. Set time aside regularly to review each means of response, dividing the responses according to question and topic.

6. Poll and Analyze Often: Polling and doing customer research once in awhile is a good start, but the more you can enact this sort of response system, the better you can stay on top of what your membership wants from you in relation to your non-profit’s mission, goals, and community action.

7. Devise a Plan and Act: After gathering the information, devising a short and long term plan to optimize your nonprofit’s initiatives and overall scope is crucial. While it’s good to know what you customers want, it is more important to offer them the actual solution. Even if the answer is expensive or will require more than what you have in resources, manpower, and/or funds; developing a plan to reach that goal and taking small, measurable though realistic steps towards it, will make your membership feel connected to your non-profit and also that their voice counts for something.

These are all simple ways that organizations can keep tabs on the effectiveness of their marketing strategies. It is always beneficial to perform a communications or marketing audit through a third party. The help of a professional specialized in non-profit advocacy can assist your organization in an exhaustive analysis of your marketing efforts and as a result, carry out your objectives.
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Mark Buzan is Principal and Chief Magnifier in Action Strategies, a full service Strategic Communications, Public Relations and Public Affairs Consultancy for non-profits and associations. Make sure to contact him for advice on reaching audiences you may or may not have yet considered in your marketing communications and PR campaigns. Drop him a line if you are looking for help in developing a public relations campaign. You can view his website at www.actionstrategies.ca.

Waska Quebec: A non-profit blog from Quebec City

I'm a contributor on a new blog! My good friend and online colleague, Jean-François Neron and founder of Waska Quebec has started an English language blog to talk about tech issues and non-profits (click here to check it out). As a consultant working with non-profits to get their heads around this new world of Web 2.0, Jean-François has generously offered up a spot to me as a contributor. If you live in or near the Quebec City region, I invite you to check them out and if you're so inclined, make a contribution to their cause. Here's a brief snippet from their history and their mission:

Waska was founded on April 26, 1982, when students in a St. Foy, Quebec, technical institute join a "human relationships class" group in order to unite forces under one organization called "Club 3E". This non-profit entity has given itself a mission: to help people overcome problems with work exeperience and related training issues.

Our newsletters are changing

For many, you might have noticed that postings have been sparse as of lately and while I am one who usually preaches the importance of regular blogging, there has been method to my madness!

By viewing my blog entry from back in March, you'll notice that I've been taking the last number of weeks and months to conduct my own social media experiment with clear tactics that deliver results for non-profits. Through my research, I've clearly found that the process starts with good content on a website that reflects the message you are wishing to convey. Admittedly, while preaching this message, I recognize that I have not been following my own advice! As such, I've been spending the last couple of weeks investigating ways to completely revamp and optomize both this blog and my website: www.actionstrategies.ca.

But this only explains one aspect of being effective on the internet. Social media for non-profits is undoubtedly a powerful tool. Reviewing what works most for non-profits, my experience tells me that when starting out, they rarely have a large following on the internet. In my mind, when starting our in Web 2.0 world, associations & charities need to consider as part of their strategy how they will build the "build up". This means also reviewing how they deliver e-newsletters because for non-profits there needs to be a strategy of "push & pull"

Once enough of a following can be build online, social media and internet optimization builds the pull-in of fans for a cause. The "push" however remains the e-newsletter. Gathering email lists and maintaining contact with supporters as I do with my own business' lists is what drives initial traffic to online presences. For a number of years, my current service of Constant Contact has been what I have relied on to get out the word (via "push") on what I've been up to and to drive traffic to even this blog.

However, in a time when I am reviewing both the look and design of this blog and my website, it's fitting that I would also at least look at the means I have of delivering the e-newsletters of the Magnifier & Corridors. I've come to an important conclusion that I'd like to impart upon non-profits looking to improve their online public relations and drive social media presence. Namely, I believe that e-newsletters, RSS feeds and blogging/ social media strategy need to come together.

In my humble view, Constant Contact does do enough to bring these services together. I'm making an important change. I'm moving the Magnifier & Corridors over to a new service will feed the RSS feed from this blog over to email. The service that allows this is MailChimp. Through the templates for the newer versions of my newsletters to you, every entry to this blog can incite an update being sent to your inbox of you are a subscriber. For NPOs who have time and cash strapped staff, I feel this feature will not only provide an importance efficiency, it will also magnify how you can pull it all together.

Going through this process of learning, I've also learned that with the appropriate e-newsletter system in place, you can even integrate social media tagging abilities within the emails you send. This means that you can have a much higher potential possibility of someone posting your articles within their social media profiles. Traditionally, most e-zines make you go to a website and from there, the visitor would need to tag the article in Facebook, YouTube, Delicious, etc. With the attentoin spans being as short as they are on the internet, the attrition rates of losing the valuable asset of visitors doing this are very high when they have to click through more than 2 pages.

But in my learning it's been more than just features that have attracted me to making a change. As I have often preached, content is king! In delivering a more effective e-zine, I have also been experimenting with richer & more effective means of content. Instead of going for initial lengthiness of newsletters, I'm going for emails that are SCANNED not read! I recommend the same crucial lesson for NPOs. This means that e-newsletters need to have article blocks that are shorter and PUNCHIER. In my discussions I have monitored amongst non-profit execs the common theme talked about was member info fatigue. Keeping emails short, I believe, improves open rates and improves the chances that links you place in the ezine will be opened as well.

While I still have some work to do, I hope to provide everyone here insight into how I progress in this great experiment for you. :) Let me know your thoughts!
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Mark Buzan is Principal and Chief Magnifier in Action Strategies, a full service Strategic Communications, Public Relations and Public Affairs Consultancy for non-profits and associations. Make sure to contact him for advice on reaching audiences you may or may not have yet considered in your marketing communications and PR campaigns. Drop him a line if you are looking for help in developing a public relations campaign. You can view his website at www.actionstrategies.ca.