In This Edition:

• Music To Quell The Savage Fundraiser
  
  
• Your Career ...
  Don’t make oral peer review a competition
  
  
• Online ...
  4 ways to keep Web visitors
  
  
• Donors ...
  Outreach needs someone on both sides
  

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Editor's Note:

Most nonprofits have been tightening budgets across the board. While some sector conferences have experienced double-digit declines in attendance, others have sold out with people scrambling on the wait list.

We want to hear from you. What makes a conference hot or not? Are your conference choices made by budget constraints or are some conference topics no longer appealing?

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Music To Quell The Savage Fundraiser

“I’m willing to be the Match.com for musicians and nonprofits,” said John Schneider, who launched MusiciansForCharity.org this past March.
 
But instead of awkward dinner conversation and personality tests, the site will try to connect nonprofits to musicians willing to volunteer their talents for events in the Washington, D.C. area.

Schneider said he was inspired to create the site by two loves in his life, working at a nonprofit and playing in a band. Schneider, vice president of communications at Landover, Md.-based Epilepsy Foundation, explained some nonprofits expend a lot of time, and money, trying to fundraise with galas and dinners. He also believes some musicians are more interested in making music than making money. And, some musicians might want to help others while they do it.

“As an artist, you like to have feedback. You need to have people appreciate your music,” said Schneider, who claims to play piano, drums, keyboard, guitar, clarinet, harmonica and kazoo. “There are a lot of nonprofits looking for opportunities to raise funds. So, I thought, why not put the two together?”

The Web site provides separate registration areas for nonprofits and musicians interested in gigs. He hopes to wrangle a range of performers, from rock bands to orchestras, to fit different nonprofit needs. Nonprofits will have to prove their 501(c)(3) status and musicians must be willing to volunteer, minus traveling expenses.

Schneider said that he hopes to expand the network outside of the nation’s capitol with his connections in the music world.

“It’s important to make this success so we are not all talk and just another pretty Web site,” he said.

Your Career ...
Don’t make oral peer review a competition

In an episode of Seinfeld, Jerry Seinfeld once said, “According to most studies, people’s number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right?”

The last step in the Advanced Certified Fundraising Executive (ACRFE) program is an Oral Peer Review. Karla A. Williams, ACFRE, gave a run-down of the four-stage professional development process during the 46th annual Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) international fundraising conference in New Orleans. Here’s what to expect so you don’t prefer being in the casket and move forward in your professional career:

Length. The Oral Peer Review takes two hours -- so make sure you have some water on hand.

Who should you expect? A three-member panel of ACFREs administers the oral review and at least one must be a member of the ACFRE Board.

Location, location, location. Review can be held at the AFP Headquarters in Arlington, Va., during scheduled Board meetings, the AFP international fundraising conference or the AFP Leadership Academy meeting.

Questions. Expect four general questions with 30 minutes to prepare notes. Then there will be four specialty questions, with two questions in each of the two areas selected by the candidate, and no preparation time. 

Review panel expectations. With each eight questions, the review panel is looking for senior-level answers that are experientially and theoretically based. Pay attention to problem-solving skills, management, the development process and tenets of fundraising ethics.

Try, try again. If you don’t pass the first time, you may retake the examination. After the second “not pass,” you must wait a year before retaking.

Online ...
4 ways to keep Web visitors

You finally scored a Web site visitor. But how do you prevent that visitor from clicking away? John Kenyon, nonprofit technology consultant and educator, explained how to create an effective Web site at NTEN’s 2009 Nonprofit Technology Conference.

Here are four tips to help you start:

• Think of your audiences. Donors aren’t the only people visiting your site – no matter how much you might wish. Let your site speak to a range of audiences, such as prospects, activists and community leaders. Think about breaking down your site in different sections, like a separate tab for media.
  
• Bring content online. Do you have printed materials such as invitations or reports? See if the printed materials can be posted online in a downloadable format or if the information would be better online in another form.
  
• Collect email addresses. The key is getting further engagement from your visitors. Try to incorporate an email sign-up box on every page of your site. Ask permission to email and then follow through. Remember -- no SPAM.
  
• Easy to read. People usually don’t read every word (just like you probably jumped to this parenthesis) on your page.  Kenyon recommends highlighting keywords, using bulleted lists and allowing one idea per paragraph. Cut your text in half and repeat. Offer links within the text to allow deeper engagement within the site.
  

Donors ...
Outreach needs someone on both sides

Listen and learn. It might sound like a phrase you tell a toddler, but really it’s an effective strategy that some nonprofits fail to consider in an outreach process, according to Michael Hoffman, CEO of Chicago-based See3 Communications.

Hoffman explained to listen and learn after each step in an outreach process, like online video outreach, at NTEN’s 2009 Nonprofit Technology Conference. Examine the process and recognize the metrics that allow you to listen and learn from your constituents:

• Deliver the message to the target audience. Track the number of hits, unique visits and online discussion. This will determine what sites are driving the most traffic to your video and you can hear the preliminary feedback.
• Engage the target audience in a conversation. Try to build a community around the conversation. Track video views and if anyone subscribes to the video feed. See how many viewers decide to comment about the video either in the space you created or in other channels.
• Influence the audience’s decisions. Encourage donation consideration. Create a space for external discussion by driving people to a section on your site. See if anyone talks about a change of heart because of your outreach. Inspire the audience to take action. Track donations, petition signatures and in-person event attendance. This will give you a broad view of what your video can do. 

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