Welcome back! Happy New Year! If you're thinking about starting a non-profit or
growing an existing non-profit in 2023 there are some Trends you're going to
want to be aware of - let's talk about seven of them in this video. [Music]
If we haven't met before, hi! I'm Amber Melanie Smith and I'm a non-profit founder
and executive director who also makes these videos on YouTube to help people aspiring to
make an impact in the world, whether that is through starting a non-profit of their own,
launching a socially responsible business, volunteering, being a leader in their Community,
or other ways. As always I hope that you find this video helpful and interesting don't forget
to give it a like, and subscribe to my channel for more content like this also if you are in
the process of starting a non-profit and you need some guidance I have a great online course at my
website FounderToFulltime.com that you can check out so each year for the past couple of years I've
done these videos talking about the trends that I'm seeing emerge across the non-profit sector
that are going to impact people who are either starting a non-profit or building up an existing
organization and it's just fascinating to see see which Trends are continuing over the years
and which new ones are emerging and of course we're in a very rapidly evolving landscape and
world as we all know um and so the seven trends that I'm going to talk about I think are some are
expected and some are surprising uh but they're all very interesting and I think if you're a
clever non-profit leader or founder you will find some opportunities to capitalize on some of these
trends that can help your cause or understand them so that you can mitigate any damage that
these Trends could do to your cause so let's get into them Trend number one is that non-profits
might expect fewer grants in 2023. this is a trend that was recently discussed in Forbes
Magazine and the reason that they have this theory that this is going to be An Occurrence in 2023 is
a reasonable Theory and that is that Foundation giving is often tied to the performance of the
financial markets and since those markets didn't perform as well as some hoped in 2022 the thought
is that in 2023 foundations might have less money to give out that they might just give out the bare
minimum that they're legally required to um and we might see some reduction in opportunities in
Grants there so what can you do about this it is recommended and honestly I recommend this all the
time not just in a year when grants are predicted to be lower but diversifying your revenue streams
as a non-profit is always a good idea especially investigating developing and investing more in
fees for service and earned income strategies I've talked about earned income strategies and some of
my other videos so you might want to check out my video uh 15 earned income strategies if you
need some inspiration or a starting point to be thinking about this but the basic idea is that you
can through the sale of goods and services that align with and further your mission also generate
revenue for your cause the second Trend that we're going to see in 2023 is an increase interest in
and investment and time spent networking with other people now networking with other people
might not get funds into your non-profits pocket right away but it is proven that the larger your
social network is as a non-profit the more donors you will have that's simply because
of the math more people know about your cause means more people within that pool love your
cause and more people within that smaller pool are willing and able to donate to your costs so
making sure that you are increasing your network in the community is going to be a big thing in 20
23 especially as more people are hosting in-person events Trend number three that I want to talk
about is a continuing Trend and I think this is a positive thing and that is a continued focus on
employee retention and well-being in non-profits so non-profits who have paid staff have developed
and implemented more strategies to help retain their employees and uplift the well-being of their
employees over the past year especially as the great resignation and the labor and job markets
have made it harder to hire good candidates in the nonprofit sector and we know that
losing staff in any business or organization but especially non-profits can be really damaging to
the continued operations of the organization and costly a recent Gallup report noted that losing
an employee can cost an organization anywhere from half to two times that employee's salary so it is
far more expensive to lose an employee and have to hire a new one than to Simply take care of the
ones that you have and aim to keep them around and we know that employee retention is on a lot
of non-profits leaders Minds in the uh sales force non-profit Trends fifth edition that just came out
28 of non-profit leaders reported that employee retention was a major challenge for them 34 of
non-profit leaders in the same report said that employee burnout and mental health issues were
also a major challenge for them and so 46 of these non-profit leaders said that employee retention
was going to become a top priority for them in 2023. if you are a non-profit who has paid staff
and you're wondering what you can do to increase the odds of keeping them around here are some
ideas and there are so many different things and also this could apply to if you're an organization
that is in the process of developing systems and structures to eventually have paid staff
it's important to think ahead about the items that I'm going to share with you in just a moment
here so that you can have these just as part of the way you do things and build in a likelihood
of employee retention from the very beginning the first thing you can do I think is pretty
obvious and that is to ensure Fair compensation if you're not sure what Fair compensation looks
like there are various online resources where you can research salaries for similar positions
in your specific local geography because we know of course that salary ranges might change City
to City based on the cost of living you can check out some of these guides there's even guides that
are non-profit specific you can look up other non-profit salaries I recommend the guide star
compensation report for that but one thing to keep in mind that's really important is that especially
in this labor market non-profits aren't just competing against other non-profits for Quality
employees they're competing against for-profit and private sector also because you know people won't
necessarily only work for a non-profit because of its amazing Mission though there are you know
some of those people out there but they also have to be able to eat and feed their families
which is a totally reasonable expectation another thing you can make sure you build into your team
infrastructure is flexible work environments I know that this isn't always possible depending
on your specific Mission as an organization but finding ways to allow this flexibility would be
really important for people especially you know people who have kids and need to make sure that
they can make sure that their child care is accounted for but hybrid work environments
and flexible scheduling are highly desired things that potential employees are looking for so if you
can build that in something to to consider another thing is just other benefits like supplementing or
covering the cost of health insurance dental insurance making retirement contributions
Etc and finally a good strong paid time off policy that allows people to rest and get
their mental health needs taken care of and spend time with their family and friends and
all of these things the fourth Trend I'm going to talk about is new and really fascinating to
me and this is a trend that is touching both the fundraising and Technology spaces but the trend is
platforms that allow donors to make a donation now but pay for that donation later it's like putting
your donation on layaway I guess a couple sites that are doing this are gibsy and beginnerist.com
I'll be sure to include links to the stuff in the description below if you're curious they are not
sponsoring this video I don't even know that they know that I exist or these videos exist but I did
find these online and I think they're really interesting um I've not seen this before it's
the ideas that donors can make a donation through these platforms but then break their donation into
payments that they make later um during designated months uh but the thing is and here's what really
got me the non-profits get the donation in full now so it's not like a pledge where a donor says
yeah I'll donate once a month or once a quarter and I promise I will but you don't see the money
until that time comes no the non-profits get all of the money now and then the donors pay
it over time so I think this is something to keep an eye on it's really interesting I will be very
curious to see if this means that people will make larger donations um and if there's any issues with
like completing the donor payments later so just something I'm planning to keep an eye on because
I find it really interesting Trend number five is donor retention and this is an ongoing Trend but I
think we're going to see even more attention paid to it in the next year because some people are
concerned about a recession and that means that it will be more cost effective to try your best
to retain the donors that you already have versus spend more time and money acquiring new donors
um you should always be doing both of those things by the way retaining your old donors and
trying to find new donors but with an increased focus on donor retention um what this will mean
is donor stewardship or if you're not familiar with that term the act of maintaining a positive
relationship with your donor over time will become a greater Focus so uh thinking through strategies
that are going to allow you to have strong donor stewardship are going to be key things like making
sure you're sending those thank you notes on time that you are keeping your donor up to date about
your latest impacts and things going on in your organization thinking of ways to help them build
community with you and each other through events or Gatherings or discussions all of these things
are going to take center stage and we know you know just like in sales it's more cost effective
to keep a current customer than to acquire a new one the same is true of donors it costs more to
acquire new donors than to keep your existing ones so just be thinking about what is your
donor stewardship strategy right now where are the gaps where could it be stronger and start planning
out some opportunities to engage your donors in 2023. Trend number six is also a technology Trend
and it is an increased focus on cyber security so there have been some high profile cyber security
problems in the news throughout 2022 across all sectors and so non-profits are going to put a lot
more focus on this uh once again according to that sales force non-profit Trends report um nonprofits
are especially likely to be the target of cyber security attacks because think about it we've got
donor databases listing people who give us money um you know with their private contact information
and all that volunteer databases information on our vulnerable populations so we are definitely
likely to be victims of cyber security attacks if you're interested in learning more about the
basics of non-profit cyber security I will leave a link to a resource I found from the Council of
nonprofits in the description below this video so you can check that out the seventh Trend relates
to social media and that is an increased use of LinkedIn for non-profits now I am not a hundred
percent sure how credible this trend is but I did find it noted on multiple different sources
and so that made me pay attention and I do kind of see some Merit here um LinkedIn tends to be
most used by adult business professionals so it could be a great place for your non-profit
to find skilled volunteers potential board members potential business sponsors
um potential you know donors or business partners I can see it having a great audience that might be
interested in supporting non-profits and offering their skills and resources from the business side
another thing about LinkedIn that I've noticed is it's a great place to establish a thought
leadership which is basically the idea that you are considered an expert in your field you're a
thought leader and being a thought leader can help you um get credibility and respect and
that can in theory lead to more financial support for your organization as well so being a thought
leader is a good thing as a non-profit leader you really want to be known as an expert in the
particular issue that your non-profit is tackling whether that is homelessness or food insecurity
or education or what have you so you can as a non-profit have a non-profit page or a group or
even have your leadership uh share news about the organization or all three of these things
but sharing news and information and research about your particular issue area and about
what your organization is doing can really help establish that credibility and thought leadership
too all right those are the seven Trends I'd love to hear what did you think are you
seeing or feeling or observing some of these Trends starting to impact your non-profit efforts
right now or are you hearing or seeing other trends that are impacting you that I didn't list
share in the comments below as I mentioned before if you are starting a non-profit and developing
fundraising strategy and whatnot I do have an online course actually two online courses at
my website founder to full-time one focused on starting a non-profit and that process and then
the other focused on developing a sustainable fundraising plan which is very important on my
website once again that's FounderToFulltime.com check those out there I also have a newsletter for
non-profit leaders and change makers of all kinds that you can subscribe to and opt out anytime and
I'll leave that link in my description below too final thing I have a Facebook group called Change
the World or Bust we have I think last time I counted about 4,000 people from around the
world and they're all talking about what they're working on and getting some great helpful advice
from each other and it's just a great group so come on by and join us that's all I have for you
today once again my name is Amber Melanie Smith happy 2023 and I hope to see you next time bye