From Our Brains to Yours
Refocus to Change the World
Why do big online organizing efforts so often fail to win the day? A trio of ideas to guide the way toward more effective online advocacy.
How is [fill in the blank] helping my organization meet its mission?
2010 will be about figuring out what analytics mean, and how to apply them to measuring the results that matter for non-profits and advocacy efforts.
Measure More than Inputs
What should organizations, coalitions, and the sector at large measure in the context of unrelenting complexity, widely dispersed responsibility, and, often, a virtual blackout when it comes to timely, reliable data?
Return on overhead investment
My very first post on this blog in January was a response to a post from Sasha Dichter about separating “program” expenses from “overhead” expenses. The non-profit world generally looks down on high overhead relative to program expenses. And program delivery is the key component for fulfilling the organization’s mission. My may point was:
“I think [...]
Analyze No More!
At Englin Consulting, we’re lucky. We work with extraordinarily smart and talented people who bring those assets to bear to make the world a better place. We love our clients and the work we get to do with them.
One thing about working with extraordinarily smart people: we’re often helping them and their teams [...]
Measure Better
Thinking about evaluation inevitably leads to thinking about measurement: what can we measure that can form the basis for evaluating our efforts?
Ideally, we’d evaluate the impact of our efforts. Did our work change minds? Did it change policy? Did it raise money or volunteer hours? Did it feed hungry people (or improve [...]
Nice emails – have we won yet?
So you’ve got an email list 200,000 names big and every time you send an email to your list you generate 25,000 emails to Members of Congress from across the country. Over the year, you generate more than 1,000,000 emails and 10,000 calls to the Hill.
Is your advocacy program successful?
Well, your activity levels are certainly [...]
Worthy goals for using social networking
If it’s Thursday, it’s time for Three Things. This week: Three worthy goals for using social networks to help your non-profits
On Monday, Shayna had a great post: “Tools are not strategies.” So true. As Shayna said, “Neither websites nor Twitter, not Convio nor social networks, not even email will yield results for your organization if [...]
Return on engagement
Sarah Evans has a great checklist over at Mashable: “Social Media for Business, The Do’s and Don’t for Sharing.”
Be transparent and authentic. Be Human – Create or join a discussion, don’t yell to a crowd.
A profile pic is worth a thousand tweets – does your pic help tell your story?
Leaving a Legacy – what you [...]
Evaluation
If it’s Thursday, it’s time for Three Things: three quick things to think about as the week comes to a close.
This week: three things about evaluation:
1. Evaluation should be closely tied to goals. If you’re evaluating the traditional PR component of your communications program, are you counting press clippings? Is that because you care most [...]