The Generosity Freakshow

In this episode, Drew Seman, now Director of Product Management at Cro Metrics (a website optimization consulting firm), shares from his experience running digital fundraising, advertising, and website optimization at Sierra Club. Drew talks about the culture of testing, walks through some of their experiments, and discusses what's holding nonprofits back when it comes to testing.

Links & Resources

Cro Metrics: https://crometrics.com/

Sierra Club: https://www.sierraclub.org/

Experiments: https://www.optimizely.com/customers/sierra-club/

What the heck is AI, really, and what role can it play in helping grow, improve, and optimize giving? Nathan Chapell, President of Futurus Group, shares his answers from his vast experience in business, philanthropy, and tech.

Links & Resources:

Futurus Group: https://www.futurusgroup.com/

How can you use money to maximize your happiness? What role does charitable giving play? And how can we make donors even happier when they give? All discussed in this episode with Michael Norton, a professor at Harvard University and co-author of 'Happy Money'.

Links & Resources

Mike Norton: https://hbs.me/2YwrJPU

Happy Money: https://amzn.to/2YGK11e

Of course, data is important in today's world but how do you get clean data? How do you use it and not drown in it? And what mistakes should you avoid? Emily Dalton, VP of Product Management at Omatic Software, discusses these questions before sharing from her career as a product manager on what a product manager does, why the 'product mindset' is useful, and how it can be used by nonprofits.

Links & Resources

Omatic: https://omaticsoftware.com/

Emily: [email protected]

Marty Cagan, SVP, & "Inspired": https://svpg.com/inspired-how-to-create-products-customers-love/

Teresa Torres: https://www.producttalk.org/

How do you respond to a natural disaster or breaking news story that's relevant to your organization? What can you do to plan and prepare for these opportunities? Matt Scott, CEO & Co-Founder of CauseMic, discusses his time at Team Rubicon and working with other nonprofits on these 'flash fundraising' strategies.

Resources & Links

CauseMic: https://causemic.com/

Flash Fundraising: https://causemic.com/flash-fundraising-101/

$427 billion was given in 2018 but was that good? Bad? Is giving growing? Overall or just some area? In current dollars or inflation adjusted? And what impact does the economy, stock market, and tax code changes have on giving? All things discussed with Dr. Una Osili, Associate Dean for Research and International Programs at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, as she chats about the Giving USA 2019 report — which she helps lead and produce — which is the annual report on philanthropy for over 40 years.

Links & Resources

Giving USA 2019:https://givingusa.org/

Lilly Family School of Philanthropy: https://philanthropy.iupui.edu/

Generosity for Life: http://generosityforlife.org/

On today’s episode, Brady geeks out on fundraising with Steven Screen from The Better Fundraising Company. Steven shares from his many years of experience on how important the offer is, how to go about creating one that inspires donors to give, and weighs in on if direct mail is dead.

Spoiler alert: it’s not.

You can learn more about Steven and The Better Fundraising Company at betterfundraising.com.

The biggest challenge facing nonprofit leaders... is it strategy? Execution? After decades of working with leaders, Christ Wignall would suggest it's actually culture. So he wrote a book about it and developed a handy tool to help monitor and address it. That's what we chat with him about in this episode geared towards leaders, managers, and anyone interested in building a great work culture.

Links & Resources:

Reaction Dashboard: http://reactiondashboard.com

Chris Wignall: https://twitter.com/chriswignall

Chuck Longfield is wicked smart and has spent 30+ years in the philanthropic space looking at giving trends, analyzing nonprofit data, and looking at donor demographics. So we ask him about all of that, and more, in this episode you don't want to miss.

Links & Resources

Blackbaud Institute: https://institute.blackbaud.com/

Longfield Family Foundation: http://www.longfieldfoundation.org/

John Haydon, nonprofit speaker, author, and consultant, joins the pod to discuss things like donor care, donor retention, and donor loyalty —among others — as well as his own personal career and health journey.

Links & Resources:

John Haydon: https://www.johnhaydon.com/