Don Akchin

Here are items of interest collected during the late summer, and shared even though past their expiration dates: Fellow marketing communications blogger Kivi Leroux Miller offers wise advice on the power of stories to communicate ideas and emotion. Idealist.com launches Common Ground, a resource for job seekers and HR mavens. A fascinating case study of a nonprofit that used a viral marketing campaign to build a new donor base. 107 Dirty Words that will bounce your email into the Spam pile Links to the above are here. But wait, there’s more: Facebook adds a feature that makes it easier for nonprofits to promote their causes. Also, links to some primers for newbies. You have 8 seconds to make a good impression on your landing page; tips for making the most of them. Message planning is an often-neglected first step to communicating; some tips. And if you’ve run out of things

Herewith, a collection of provocative links about those scary new media, just in time for Halloween. Maybe not so frightful to you, but to those of us in the pre-Millenial generations, these are white-knuckle words. Anyway: YouTube announces two special deals to entice nonprofit users. 7 essentials and other best practices of Facebook, and why it matters now more than ever. Censorship in cyberspace – the latest incidents to prove that “web neutrality” is not a given. And a contrarian’s take on why all web writing need not be “anorexic.” All the links available here.

Here are items of interest collected during the late summer, and shared even though past their expiration dates: Fellow marketing communications blogger Kivi Leroux Miller offers wise advice on the power of stories to communicate ideas and emotion. Idealist.com launches Common Ground, a resource for job seekers and HR mavens. A fascinating case study of a nonprofit that used a viral marketing campaign to build a new donor base. 107 Dirty Words that will bounce your email into the Spam pile Links to the above are here. But wait, there’s more: Facebook adds a feature that makes it easier for nonprofits to promote their causes. Also, links to some primers for newbies. You have 8 seconds to make a good impression on your landing page; tips for making the most of them. Message planning is an often-neglected first step to communicating; some tips. And if you’ve run out of things

Herewith, a collection of provocative links about those scary new media, just in time for Halloween. Maybe not so frightful to you, but to those of us in the pre-Millenial generations, these are white-knuckle words. Anyway: YouTube announces two special deals to entice nonprofit users. 7 essentials and other best practices of Facebook, and why it matters now more than ever. Censorship in cyberspace – the latest incidents to prove that “web neutrality” is not a given. And a contrarian’s take on why all web writing need not be “anorexic.” All the links available here.

Here are items of interest collected during the late summer, and shared even though past their expiration dates: Fellow marketing communications blogger Kivi Leroux Miller offers wise advice on the power of stories to communicate ideas and emotion. Idealist.com launches Common Ground, a resource for job seekers and HR mavens. A fascinating case study of a nonprofit that used a viral marketing campaign to build a new donor base. 107 Dirty Words that will bounce your email into the Spam pile Links to the above are here. But wait, there’s more: Facebook adds a feature that makes it easier for nonprofits to promote their causes. Also, links to some primers for newbies. You have 8 seconds to make a good impression on your landing page; tips for making the most of them. Message planning is an often-neglected first step to communicating; some tips. And if you’ve run out of things

Herewith, a collection of provocative links about those scary new media, just in time for Halloween. Maybe not so frightful to you, but to those of us in the pre-Millenial generations, these are white-knuckle words. Anyway: YouTube announces two special deals to entice nonprofit users. 7 essentials and other best practices of Facebook, and why it matters now more than ever. Censorship in cyberspace – the latest incidents to prove that “web neutrality” is not a given. And a contrarian’s take on why all web writing need not be “anorexic.” All the links available here.

These are short bits, with links to primary sources. I should be doing these monthly but I’ve fallen behind a bit. A marketing study confirms: The most effective fund-raising appeals target the heart, not the head. A free Web tool scores the emotional appeal of your headline. A website redesign, informed by reader preferences, makes huge difference in online fundraising results. Download a free handbook on using mobile phones for fundraising. Point: you can improve readability of email newsletters.Counterpoint: Don’t waste your time.Details Great moments in advocacy communication: The “Click It or Ticket” seatbelt campaign signs up the perfect celebrity spokesman: New Jersey Gov. John Corzine. U.S. House members take the Food Stamp Challenge, living on $21 of groceries for a week. Seattle commuters greeted by life-size photographic cutouts of homeless children holding hand-made signs saying “Don’t Just Look Away.” Research firm conducts study of what really works in online

These are short bits, with links to primary sources. I should be doing these monthly but I’ve fallen behind a bit. A marketing study confirms: The most effective fund-raising appeals target the heart, not the head. A free Web tool scores the emotional appeal of your headline. A website redesign, informed by reader preferences, makes huge difference in online fundraising results. Download a free handbook on using mobile phones for fundraising. Point: you can improve readability of email newsletters.Counterpoint: Don’t waste your time.Details Great moments in advocacy communication: The “Click It or Ticket” seatbelt campaign signs up the perfect celebrity spokesman: New Jersey Gov. John Corzine. U.S. House members take the Food Stamp Challenge, living on $21 of groceries for a week. Seattle commuters greeted by life-size photographic cutouts of homeless children holding hand-made signs saying “Don’t Just Look Away.” Research firm conducts study of what really works in online

These are short bits, with links to primary sources. I should be doing these monthly but I’ve fallen behind a bit. A marketing study confirms: The most effective fund-raising appeals target the heart, not the head. A free Web tool scores the emotional appeal of your headline. A website redesign, informed by reader preferences, makes huge difference in online fundraising results. Download a free handbook on using mobile phones for fundraising. Point: you can improve readability of email newsletters.Counterpoint: Don’t waste your time.Details Great moments in advocacy communication: The “Click It or Ticket” seatbelt campaign signs up the perfect celebrity spokesman: New Jersey Gov. John Corzine. U.S. House members take the Food Stamp Challenge, living on $21 of groceries for a week. Seattle commuters greeted by life-size photographic cutouts of homeless children holding hand-made signs saying “Don’t Just Look Away.” Research firm conducts study of what really works in online

The Casey Cares Foundation is a small, seven-year-old Maryland nonprofit that enhances the lives of critically ill children and their families. On June 3, it suffered a critical crisis of its own when the warehouse that was its rented office space burned to the ground. Everything tangible, from desks to donor lists to gifts for children, was destroyed. But Casey Baynes and her mostly-volunteer staff must have been doing something to engender loyalty, as this article from the Baltimore Sun relates: “I couldn’t believe it,” said Baynes. “A man who we’d just sent tickets to the monster truck show for his son showed up at midnight to say, ‘How can I help you?’…Another family whose children were helped by the Casey Cares Foundation set up a lemonade stand in their Brooklyn Park neighborhood, Baynes said. They sent the charity the proceeds – more than $750. ….”Everyone’s trying to help us

The Casey Cares Foundation is a small, seven-year-old Maryland nonprofit that enhances the lives of critically ill children and their families. On June 3, it suffered a critical crisis of its own when the warehouse that was its rented office space burned to the ground. Everything tangible, from desks to donor lists to gifts for children, was destroyed. But Casey Baynes and her mostly-volunteer staff must have been doing something to engender loyalty, as this article from the Baltimore Sun relates: “I couldn’t believe it,” said Baynes. “A man who we’d just sent tickets to the monster truck show for his son showed up at midnight to say, ‘How can I help you?’…Another family whose children were helped by the Casey Cares Foundation set up a lemonade stand in their Brooklyn Park neighborhood, Baynes said. They sent the charity the proceeds – more than $750. ….”Everyone’s trying to help us

The Casey Cares Foundation is a small, seven-year-old Maryland nonprofit that enhances the lives of critically ill children and their families. On June 3, it suffered a critical crisis of its own when the warehouse that was its rented office space burned to the ground. Everything tangible, from desks to donor lists to gifts for children, was destroyed. But Casey Baynes and her mostly-volunteer staff must have been doing something to engender loyalty, as this article from the Baltimore Sun relates: “I couldn’t believe it,” said Baynes. “A man who we’d just sent tickets to the monster truck show for his son showed up at midnight to say, ‘How can I help you?’…Another family whose children were helped by the Casey Cares Foundation set up a lemonade stand in their Brooklyn Park neighborhood, Baynes said. They sent the charity the proceeds – more than $750. ….”Everyone’s trying to help us

After 23 years of living in a three-story old Victorian, my fellow empty-nester and I seized the opportunity to move to a smaller but comfortable co-op apartment. When the home moves, so does the home office, but not without difficulties. I won’t recite the whole tale, chapter and verse. Suffice to say that it took five days to get a working telephone jack installed properly in the right room, four days to restore a DSL connection and 14 days to get a cell phone that functions inside the building. During this transition period, I spent about six hours on the telephone with automated answering systems, three hours on hold, two hours talking to pleasant but poorly informed “tech” people in India and The Philippines, an hour on the telephone with Americans, and three hours talking to the four telephone company employees who were dispatched to my home. I also had

After 23 years of living in a three-story old Victorian, my fellow empty-nester and I seized the opportunity to move to a smaller but comfortable co-op apartment. When the home moves, so does the home office, but not without difficulties. I won’t recite the whole tale, chapter and verse. Suffice to say that it took five days to get a working telephone jack installed properly in the right room, four days to restore a DSL connection and 14 days to get a cell phone that functions inside the building. During this transition period, I spent about six hours on the telephone with automated answering systems, three hours on hold, two hours talking to pleasant but poorly informed “tech” people in India and The Philippines, an hour on the telephone with Americans, and three hours talking to the four telephone company employees who were dispatched to my home. I also had

After 23 years of living in a three-story old Victorian, my fellow empty-nester and I seized the opportunity to move to a smaller but comfortable co-op apartment. When the home moves, so does the home office, but not without difficulties. I won’t recite the whole tale, chapter and verse. Suffice to say that it took five days to get a working telephone jack installed properly in the right room, four days to restore a DSL connection and 14 days to get a cell phone that functions inside the building. During this transition period, I spent about six hours on the telephone with automated answering systems, three hours on hold, two hours talking to pleasant but poorly informed “tech” people in India and The Philippines, an hour on the telephone with Americans, and three hours talking to the four telephone company employees who were dispatched to my home. I also had

Nothing summons up feelings of inadequacy quite as fast as the contents of marketing publications. I opened an email newsletter from the AMA this week and almost took to my sickbed as my eyes ricocheted around these phrases: Web analytics solution Measuring Web 2.0 Technologies Applying Consumer Segmentation for Maximum Impact 10-Step Road Map to Data Optimization Management of high-volume B2C customer acquisition and B2B lead generation campaign But after a few seconds, I got a grip, reassuring myself that:a) I did have a vague idea what most of those expressions meant, and anyway,b) 95 percent of it was irrelevant to me and my clients. If you’re the sort of acccidental marketer who wants to learn every conceivable thing about the field, by all means subscribe to as many marketing trade journals as you can stomach. But when you feel your head is about to explode, THROW THEM AWAY. There

Nothing summons up feelings of inadequacy quite as fast as the contents of marketing publications. I opened an email newsletter from the AMA this week and almost took to my sickbed as my eyes ricocheted around these phrases: Web analytics solution Measuring Web 2.0 Technologies Applying Consumer Segmentation for Maximum Impact 10-Step Road Map to Data Optimization Management of high-volume B2C customer acquisition and B2B lead generation campaign But after a few seconds, I got a grip, reassuring myself that:a) I did have a vague idea what most of those expressions meant, and anyway,b) 95 percent of it was irrelevant to me and my clients. If you’re the sort of acccidental marketer who wants to learn every conceivable thing about the field, by all means subscribe to as many marketing trade journals as you can stomach. But when you feel your head is about to explode, THROW THEM AWAY. There

Nothing summons up feelings of inadequacy quite as fast as the contents of marketing publications. I opened an email newsletter from the AMA this week and almost took to my sickbed as my eyes ricocheted around these phrases: Web analytics solution Measuring Web 2.0 Technologies Applying Consumer Segmentation for Maximum Impact 10-Step Road Map to Data Optimization Management of high-volume B2C customer acquisition and B2B lead generation campaign But after a few seconds, I got a grip, reassuring myself that:a) I did have a vague idea what most of those expressions meant, and anyway,b) 95 percent of it was irrelevant to me and my clients. If you’re the sort of acccidental marketer who wants to learn every conceivable thing about the field, by all means subscribe to as many marketing trade journals as you can stomach. But when you feel your head is about to explode, THROW THEM AWAY. There

What moves donors to give is emotional connection to the cause, and communication needs to touch those emotional receptors. A 9-year-old candidate for President highlights the case for children’s health insurance coverage. Those darned baby boomers are just not like other (a) donors (b) volunteers – in case you hadn’t noticed. Details and links here.

What moves donors to give is emotional connection to the cause, and communication needs to touch those emotional receptors. A 9-year-old candidate for President highlights the case for children’s health insurance coverage. Those darned baby boomers are just not like other (a) donors (b) volunteers – in case you hadn’t noticed. Details and links here.

What moves donors to give is emotional connection to the cause, and communication needs to touch those emotional receptors. A 9-year-old candidate for President highlights the case for children’s health insurance coverage. Those darned baby boomers are just not like other (a) donors (b) volunteers – in case you hadn’t noticed. Details and links here.

A colleague who markets for a university complained the other day about a hard-to-please internal constituency. Last fall, with a significant marketing budget for the first time in a decade, she launched an online campaign. So far, inquiries have doubled, applications have doubled, quality is higher – yet some members of the faculty (the difficult constituency) want empirical proof that marketing deserves the credit. Here’s some proof from a survey by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and Lipman Hearne, a fundraising consulting firm. The key finding is that colleges and universities that invest more than 0.5 percent of their operating budgets (excluding salaries and benefits) in marketing get good returns in quality applicants and higher enrollment yield. But that won’t satisfy my colleague’s inquisitors. These faculty understand cause and effect, but that’s not their issue. The real issue is that marketing got a budget increase.

A colleague who markets for a university complained the other day about a hard-to-please internal constituency. Last fall, with a significant marketing budget for the first time in a decade, she launched an online campaign. So far, inquiries have doubled, applications have doubled, quality is higher – yet some members of the faculty (the difficult constituency) want empirical proof that marketing deserves the credit. Here’s some proof from a survey by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and Lipman Hearne, a fundraising consulting firm. The key finding is that colleges and universities that invest more than 0.5 percent of their operating budgets (excluding salaries and benefits) in marketing get good returns in quality applicants and higher enrollment yield. But that won’t satisfy my colleague’s inquisitors. These faculty understand cause and effect, but that’s not their issue. The real issue is that marketing got a budget increase.

A colleague who markets for a university complained the other day about a hard-to-please internal constituency. Last fall, with a significant marketing budget for the first time in a decade, she launched an online campaign. So far, inquiries have doubled, applications have doubled, quality is higher – yet some members of the faculty (the difficult constituency) want empirical proof that marketing deserves the credit. Here’s some proof from a survey by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and Lipman Hearne, a fundraising consulting firm. The key finding is that colleges and universities that invest more than 0.5 percent of their operating budgets (excluding salaries and benefits) in marketing get good returns in quality applicants and higher enrollment yield. But that won’t satisfy my colleague’s inquisitors. These faculty understand cause and effect, but that’s not their issue. The real issue is that marketing got a budget increase.

How do you make yourself a better marketer? A lot of really smart nonprofit marketeers have given the subject some thought, and even put their thoughts into words to share with the rest of us foundering about. You can pick their brains at the Carnival of Nonprofit Marketers, a weekly feature that travels from blog to blog and is almost always worth the time. This one is no exception.