Strategic Online Communication for Nonprofits

Posts Tagged ‘strategic communication’

Sure, having a celebrity founder and spokesman helps, but many celebrities have foundations that don’t enjoy anywhere near the same popularity as the Livestrong Foundation.

Why has the foundation been so successful?  In part because they’re doing everything right with regard to their online presence:

• A dynamic, interactive, attention-grabbing website, with a “We Believe” declaration so inspiring it reaches to the depths of your soul.
  • A “donate now” message that grabs your attention.  You can’t miss it—marked with the trademark yellow bracelet.
  • Once you click on “donate now” the first message you see reassures you that your money will be spent wisely (78% of all donations go directly to grants and programs).
  • The site offers multiple ways to make a donation, with something that appeals to everyone: “in memory”, “wedding donations”, “workplace giving”, “events support”, “download a song from iTunes” and more.  They’ve thought of every way you might want to give and made it easy for you.
  • For those who prefer to make a purchase and receive something in return, there’s a link with products to choose from that make both a fashion statement and a values statement.
  • The site is easy to navigate and tells you everything you need to know, in simple language.
  • In plain view you can access their services and see testimonies and photos of people they’ve helped—which again reassures you that your donations really make a difference.

• A strategic partnership with Nike through sale of their products, which brings visibility to their cause and drives new traffic
• A strong social media presence, with over half a million fans of their Facebook page, 200,000+ members of their Facebook cause, and even 60,000+ fans of their Spanish-language Facebook page.  Livestrong also has 30,000+ followers on Twitter.  That’s a lot of daily exposure.
• Innovative media coverage, most recently through the Tour de France “chalkbot” that enabled people around the world to have their text messages chalked on the pavement during the competition.

Their web presence is a bit fragmented, with several different sites drawing in different traffic (just under 80,000 unique monthly visitors to Livestrong.org and 650,000+ monthly visitors to Livestrong.com, 60+ different Facebook pages or causes) but the bottom line is that they are using every major online tool to get their message out.

And it’s working.  Livestrong raises over $30 million a year, with a large portion of their revenue coming from small donations from individual donors.  That’s strategic online communication with undisputable results.