The Creative Marketer

For anybody who wants to go behind the scenes in my journey here.

In this episode, Dan Sanchez talks about the purpose behind the podcast.

In this Episode, Dan Sanchez talks about the next phase of this podcast.

Recently, I published a blog post about some of my accomplishments (and setbacks) in 2019.

One of the accomplishments was the fact that I read 46 books this past year—the most I’ve ever read in a year. That equals almost a book a week, and this year, I’m aiming for 52.

How did I read that many books and still retain enough information to apply to my work context? That’s some of what we’ll be covering here.

What we talked about:

Why nonprofit marketers should read more

How to read more, faster

My top 10 nonprofit marketing/fundraising books from 2019

Recently, I published a blog post about some of my accomplishments (and setbacks) in 2019.

One of the accomplishments was the fact that I read 46 books this past year—the most I’ve ever read in a year. That equals almost a book a week, and this year, I’m aiming for 52.

How did I read that many books and still retain enough information to apply to my work context? That’s some of what we’ll be covering here.

What we talked about:

Why nonprofit marketers should read more

How to read more, faster

My top 10 nonprofit marketing/fundraising books from 2019

People like to use the word "strategic" to describe whatever they're doing. But what actually makes something strategic? And how does strategy inform marketing?

Mark Slezinger, marketing director at the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, joined the podcast to talk about the critical, high-level questions you need to ask before considering any type of tactical, execution-level questions.

What we talked about:

What makes something strategic

The process to becoming a strategic marketer

How a strategic process results in growth

Mark's advice about strategy for other marketing leaders

Data leads to insight, and insight leads to dollars. As a nonprofit organization, your data structure and products need to turn the information they hold into stories and those stories into valuable relationships. When selecting the right product and building a new data structure, however, you have to consider how people relate to technology and change.

Matt Schmitt serves as digital technology manager at Bethany International. In this episode, he talks about how we migrated the organization's donor management software from Blackboard's Razor's Edge to Salesforce.

What we talked about:

Why flexibility is key to supporting complex systems

Why Salesforce won Bethany's business

How to get all the stakeholders on board with a new process and product

Practical steps for transitioning from one CRM to another

How to know if you should work with a data consultant

Dr. Randy Dirks has done a lot of grant writing for Bethany International. There may be no better person to explain what a grant is, when nonprofits should apply for them, and what major mistakes they should avoid in grant writing.

Randy is Vice President at Bethany International. In this episode, he shares expert advice on how nonprofits can use grant writing for long-term growth.

What we talked about:

What are grants? What is grant writing?

Why would a nonprofit apply for a grant? Why wouldn’t they?

Where to find grants

Common grant writing mistakes

How to better your chances of receiving more than one grant from a foundation

How do you define branding? There are two aspects:

1. Your look, which is what everybody thinks of. A logo, colors, a business card.

2. Your message. This is the other side: the story, the community connections, the voice you have.

Today’s guest is Brandon Crist, Owner and CEO of Brand Mentors. Brandon tells nonprofits how they can collect the branding elements they have scattered about and pull them together to form a cohesive, consistent brand.

What we talked about:

How to define branding

The elements of a nonprofit’s brand

Successful branding strategies for nonprofits

Brand guidelines

How nonprofits can get started with branding

Resources:

BrandMentors.com

Donald Miller’s StoryBrand

[email protected]

You can find this interview, and many more, by subscribing to the Nonprofit Growth podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get podcasts.