Nonprofit marketing is the use of marketing tactics by a nonprofit organization to promote the message and the organization, as well as raise donations.
Marketing is as important for nonprofit organizations as it is for businesses and uses many of the same marketing tactics to connect with donors and volunteers. It is also often challenging, as nonprofits must convince their audience to give money without getting anything concrete in return.
What Does Nonprofit Marketing Do?
Nonprofit marketing serves multiple functions in keeping charitable organizations functioning.
Create awareness. Like any business brand, a nonprofit must make their audience aware of its organization and the causes it supports.
Promote your cause and services. Donors and volunteers aren’t the only ones who need to know about the work that nonprofits do. The group, or groups, that nonprofits work with also need to know about the work the organization is doing so they can put those services to use.
Fundraise. Nonprofits rely on donations in order to pursue their charitable initiatives. Fundraising is an essential function of nonprofit marketing, and it can take the form of encouraging general donations or promoting specific fundraising events.
Encourage memberships and recurring donations. In addition to specific fundraising goals, nonprofit marketing should be used to encourage long-term membership. This increases the relationships that the nonprofit can draw on for events and initiatives, as well as providing recurring donations that serve as a reliable and predictable budget.
Engage volunteers. Most nonprofits need people to take action or participate in initiatives, as well as donate. Nonprofit marketing encourages volunteers to get involved, both in specific events and in long-term roles.
Drive political and social change. Skillful nonprofit marketing can bring causes and problems to cultural prominence. This puts pressure on opinion leaders, politicians, and ordinary people to create social and political changes that address the nonprofit’s causes.
Types of Nonprofit Marketing
No matter what specific goals nonprofit marketing is used to pursue, most campaigns fall into one of four categories.
- Traditional fundraising asks consumers to make a monetary donation to a cause or charitable campaign. It requires teaching consumers to care about the problem that the organization is seeking to address. Fundraising initiatives can be directed at individuals or organizations. Some businesses partner with nonprofits to create long-term fundraising around causes that their employees care about.
- Consumer charity is a partnership with a for-profit business that encourages consumers to use their purchasing power to assist charitable organizations. This usually takes the form of cause marketing, in which consumers buy products because part of the purchase price will be donated to a specific cause or nonprofit. This type of partnership with for-profit businesses makes it easy and appealing for consumers to donate by attaching that donation to a product they would be buying anyway.
- Message-focused campaigns attempt to build awareness, encourage political change, or affect consumer behavior. These campaigns may be focused on individual groups or more broadly at the general public, and they may be tied to high-profile current events. They are generally paired with or followed by specific fundraising or volunteer sign-up campaigns to take advantage of increased public concern.
- Event marketing is focused around a single charitable drive or promotional event, usually one at which donations will be collected or the cost of admission will go directly to the nonprofit. These marketing initiatives often combine the message of the nonprofit with the prestige of a special guest or celebrity partner whose public image and professional connections are used to drive attendance.