Innovative Concepts

Renewing with Purpose
Photo Credit

Three calls in the past week have started with appeals to make year-end financial donations.  Each was from a causes that I have previously supported.  I assume most of you have received some of your own.  The quickest way for an organizations to alienate me is to inform me that they are sending a pledge form in the mail to my home address even when I have made it clear that I will consider renewing but I am not prepared to make commitment at this time.  A pledge is a contract with the cause that I intend to make a philanthropic gift.  It is more than a gesture and under some interpretations a pledge represents a legal obligation.  Now you rarely hear of a nonprofit organization taking a donor to the collection agency to make good on a pledge if circumstances or inclinations change but once a pledge is signed and returned it must be reported on the nonprofit’s tax return for the current fiscal year.  I readily encourage causes to send me information or even a reminder but a pledge card suggests we have an agreement.  I have seen data that the conversion rate on pledge cards is much higher than just mailing a donor card.  I would suggest that if your campaign is based on trolling for anyone with a credit cards number who has had a previous interaction with your cause then you are preaching to the uninspired.  However, if you have a relationship and gain permission then you are asking your fans to add to their investment.  


Sports fans who hold season tickets make a critical decision every year.  They receive a window of time in which to renew their tickets.  If the only time the fan hears from the team is around renewal time, the relationships is most likely transactional.  If however, the fan is connected to the players and identifies with what the team stands for then it takes extenuating circumstances to keep a fan from renewing.


Do you have fans or are you relying on sleight of hand?



Make it Yours

Why do so many causes mirror their competition and partners?  I received four end-of-the-year appeal letters this week that all started with the same opening line.  At the airport this morning a person told me all the facts and figures about the nonprofit they serve.  When I asked them how it compared to similar enterprises in their community, this inspired individual told me many more facts and figures.  I immediately recalled attempting to select a new mobile phone number this week.  The phone company representative who I was speaking with offered numerous four digit options in rapid fire.  I could not even write the numbers down since they came so quickly.  Finally, the agent suggested one that seemed easy to grasp.  This was not remarkable, it was simply convenient.


My focus is to inspire causes to create their identity theirs and not be defined by your neighbors metrics.  Own your purpose and wear it.  Tell me what you believe and then have the facts and figures to answer my specific questions.  Be authentic, insist your enterprise’s actions are consistent with the cause’s stated purpose.  Why overwhelm those who are being introduced to your cause with bizarre.  Most house tours I have received do not start out with the owner stating the framing was 2″ x 6″.  They talk about how the home serves their lifestyle.  Guests should be able to see, feel, touch, and feel an organization’s vibe.  Create an environment that brings forth your best ideas.  If that means assembling in front of a campfire in folding camping chairs then bring the marshmallows.  Duplication simply folds you into the batter and you are destine for a cookie cutter.  Please stand out, we need the inspiration you generate!   

I am Sorry

Yesterday I turned off our cable TV service (keeping our broadband internet) and returned the equipment to the cable provider.  As I placed the digital cable box on the office counter the cable company representative said, ‘I am sorry.’  Sorry about what I thought?  Sorry that I am customizing the service to meet my needs?  Sorry that I will paying less money? The sorry was intended for the cable company, not me as a customer.  When a client interacts with our enterprise and we may have expectations about their needs that are not in alignment with the customer’s intentions.  We apologize or become frustrated when we believe they are not getting maximum value from our cause.  Yet in may be that they are receiving everything they desire and our sorry is misplaced and possibly awkward.

How do you measure and gauge your client’s needs?

Guarantee

What guarantee do you place on your services?  Will you go back and fix that which broke?  Will you offer free hours of professional services to take a client to their best level?  Do you accept returns and for how long?  How do you measure level of satisfaction and is it yours or your customer’s?  Patagonia’s commitment to their fans is well stated in their recent Common Threads campaign.

Responsibility

The price of greatness is responsibility

~ Winston Churchill

Many of my transformational moments have come when somebody provides not only feedback but a suggestion on how to improve.  Their advice was an investment in my growth and formed a partnership.  It is easy for us to lob a complaint at any entity using a customer feedback form and hope for some form of acknowledgement or even a token of good-will.  Rarely do we take the responsibility of providing a solution.  A recommended improvement offers an actionable course by which we can measure growth.  Just saying, ‘don’t do that again’ cuts off many other options and limits dialogue.  Reading the New Yorker article on the origins of the Occupy Wall Street movement, I was intrigued by the following summation.
“But, in the end, the point of Occupy Wall Street is not its platform so much as its form: people sit down and hash things out instead of passing their complaints on to Washington. “We are our demands,” as the slogan goes. And horizontalism seems made for this moment. It relies on people forming loose connections quickly.”
It makes me wonder how many complaints could have been rephrased as suggestions?  How many times could I have offered a reasonable and unique solution to a problem?  How easy is it for me to yell into the wind and assume a concert hall audience is listening?  Perhaps the greatest responsibility comes in taking the first step to correct that which can be fixed.

Home
Alhambra

Three months in Spain and now suddenly I find myself home in Idaho, a state most citizen’s in Europe have never heard of and is best described as being between Seattle and Salt Lake City (or kind of near Las Vegas) to those who inquire.  The transition come with the usual challenges like waking too early in the morning, greeting in the wrong language, or attempting to complete a transaction with Euros.

What was most remarkable was the shift of priorities during these three months.  Living from one suitcase each, we learned that our wardrobe did not define us.  A television with no English speaking channels provided a model of another way and the cable subscription at home is being jettisoned.  Shopping for meals was a daily ritual given the proximity of local farmers markets and the desire to enjoy fresh bread from one of the neighborhood bakeries.  Walking, more walking, and some more walking was a part of most days interrupted only by a trip on the metro or bus to get where we were headed.  

What struck me most was the chance to revisit a museum or historic site and come to understand it a little more each time given the context of other places visited in the interim.  Suddenly the emotional connection to one painting was enhanced because we had seen the sketch studies at another gallery.  Then a trip to the town where the artist lived added context.  Walking through a photography exhibit of the Spanish Civil War set the scene for the world events influencing the painter’s perspective.  And seeing the architecture that dominated the city offered a sense of place.  We would frequently walk past the Placa del Rei in Barcelona.  The very courtyard that Christopher Columbus returned to Spain with his cargo of Native Americans to present to Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand. The gold that he unloaded as part of his bounty would ultimately adorn a cathedral in Toledo, Spain.  We were seven thousand miles away from our home and yet its history was so closely tied to events that took place just blocks from our apartment.  Perhaps the understanding of how interconnected the world has been and continues to be was made palpable.  The sense of adding to our understanding was the joy of adventuring out each day.  The ability to sit for an moment and absorb the presence of a place was a gift.  Above all, the importance of daily discovery illuminated our journey.

The Power of Holding the Spotlight
Spain

The power of those who stand behind the spotlight and direct its illuminations is an often under appreciated.  A powerful beam of light attracts attention and the shadow it casts can be even more expansive.  So many causes scramble to be in the spotlight.  They want the local paper to write more articles on their amazing work.  Enterprises wish to be profiled in the Visitor Bureau’s marketing materials.  Consider the opportunity to change the paradigm.  What if the community comes to your door to help draw attention to their initiatives.

Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago. ~ Warren Buffett