Many nonprofit organizations that I know of are struggling right now during the
coronavirus pandemic to stay afloat financially, to fundraise, and to continue
their missions. I've seen this firsthand in my own organization and then dozens
that we're working with in my community and across the country as well. So in
this video I wanted to share just a couple of the strategies that we are
trying out in the hopes of adapting to this situation and we hope surviving it.
Welcome back! My name once again is Amber Melanie Smith. I'm a nonprofit founder,
executive director, and I make these videos here on YouTube to help aspiring
changemakers with tips and strategies to help you make an impact and live a life
of purpose. I've got lots of videos on how to start a non-profit, how to
fundraise for a non-profit, how to make an impact outside of the nonprofit world
and through volunteering and service and social enterprise, so I hope that you'll
check out the rest of my channel and go ahead and hit that subscribe button so
that we can stay connected. This is a hard time for everyone and definitely
for nonprofits as well. Nonprofits have always historically been expected to do
a lot for the community on very, very little - but now many organizations are
being looked to as leaders to step up to feed people who are hungry and way more
of them, to make sure people are getting access to health care and medical care,
to making sure people have roofs over their heads - and at the same time these
organizations are having to do so with reduced donations, reduced volunteers,
reduced grants, and possibly no access to government support. Nobody knows what
the future holds, but I wanted to come here and at least share a couple of the
things that we are doing in my organization that might be helpful to
others. I'll also include a few tips and strategies that I've heard of as working
for some other organizations as well. So here we go - non-profit pandemic survival
tips. Tip number one - this feels a little counterintuitive,
because of course it's scary to admit that you are scared, and that you don't
know if your organization will survive - but the first tip is to engage your
donors and supporters even MORE than you were in the past.
Especially if you have more time during the day because some of your other work
has halted as a result of the pandemic, now is a great time to be doing personal
emails, personal phone calls, Zoom or whatever teleconferencing software you
use, video chats with your supporters and donors. My organization has started doing
this once a week with our supporters of all kinds of all levels as well as our
corporate sponsors to just keep them in the loop share what is going on what we
are working on how we are pivoting and trying to adjust to this new situation
and I've also heard of other organizations doing the same thing and
what it really allows your supporters to do is feel closer to your work and
connected to you and like they if they are in a position to do so could be a
part of the solution of helping you stay afloat this one's part of it but you
want to be doing a lot of storytelling share even the smallest stories of
someone you ran into on the street who just you just felt this great kindness
towards and they were kind back at you or or a beautiful bird on your
windowsill even the smallest of stories you want to be sharing the impact that
you're making the human connections that you are experiencing during this time to
put some good news out there in the world because we're hearing a lot of the
bad and not enough of the good now this next one is a little tricky depending on
your mission but if you can get creative and think of a way to do it I highly
encourage you to do so you want to find a way for your existing volunteer base
to still support you virtually or remotely from home
don't forget and I've talked about this in some of my other videos as well
volunteers want to support you and sometimes they are also donors people
love to give their time when they get invested in your cause
they also those same people also love to give their dollars I mean think about it
if you have a friend or a family member that you spend a lot of time with and
then they came to you and asked for your help financially you wouldn't say no
because you'd already spent time with them no you'd be more likely to give
your financial support as well because you love them and you want to help them
out same thing applies here you want to be able to keep your volunteers who love
you and want to help you engaged so a couple of ideas on how to do this my
organization I'm I've said this in past videos we are all about mobilizing
volunteers so we have come up with a remote volunteer project campaign where
we've got about a dozen different ways that you can help out
different causes from our community from home whether that's using materials you
have a home or kid-friendly project so we've got folks doing cards for kids in
the hospital we've got people writing letters to isolated seniors we have the
super cool artistic project where you can paint a portrait of a pet who needs
adoption to help raise awareness about that pet
we've got people making calls to seniors we have people doing internet research
to help people understand the causes in the community there's so much that you
can do from a computer or from your homes you just have to get creative and
give your volunteers a way to stay involved even if they're staying at home
the third strategy is of course to make sure you are familiar with how any
available government support for small businesses and qualifying nonprofits
works I know this one's tricky because some of the money has run out for
support for small business businesses and nonprofits but it sounds like they
might be granting an additional layer of support soon so just take this time to
get familiar with the small business loans available and any paycheck
protection programs if your nonprofit happens to have staff and you would
qualify for that get familiar and gather your paperwork now because there is a
chance that you might be able to apply for the support in the future I know for
my organization we use QuickBooks and donor management
software club little green light we also do our payroll through a vendor so it
was very easy for us to just download the paperwork that we needed to be able
to submit our application now caveat to this you want to of course be familiar
with the government support available but you also want to once again be
communicating transparently with your donors and with local foundations and
any corporate sponsors that you might have a relationship with because these
organizations are trying right now to research and figure out the most
effective ways to help the nonprofits in their community you want to make sure
that they're aware of you that they know your needs and if the situation is dire
that they know that now is the time to be open and honest about that for sure
this strategy is something that my organization and some others that I know
of has have also implemented if you are in a position to be able to do so have
your team work remotely of course and if you're doing that ramp up communications
and staff meetings previously I had meeting with my staff every two weeks
now we've moved that to every one week so that we can stay in touch
meetings are definitely productive and move faster and very efficiently the
idea is to just not let too much time pass without us checking in with each
other and holding each other accountable and if you're a nonprofit just doesn't
have staff then you should still be doing with this with your core group of
volunteers and your board of directors it's just a really good idea your board
ideally is showing leadership right now and helping guide the direction of the
organization to pivot to manage this situation well but you in a leadership
position also need to be making sure that you're in touch with your board and
keeping them apprised of all situations very regularly the fifth tip and
strategy I have for you for surviving this pandemic as a nonprofit is this if
your mission has slowed down because the services you're able to offer you can't
offer them anymore or the materials you needed to implement your mission you can
them anymore whatever the reason if your mission work has slowed down now is the
perfect time to be devoting more energy and time to training and research and
strategic planning no one knows what the world is going to look like but you can
at least be absorbing it all taking the pulse of your community of the people
you're trying to serve and start formulating a plan research new
potential funding streams that are less reliant on events which of course we
know are heavily impacted by pandemics trying out virtual fundraisers trying to
attract more small donors maybe your donor base can no longer give as much as
they were able to but they might still be able to give a little bit so how can
you build that initiative up take this time now to be planning so that when all
of this starts to get better you will be in a great position to lead change in
your community this also applies to your programs how might you adjust what your
programs are doing to be more resistant to future outbreaks if you have classes
or trainings as part of your nonprofits work can they be done virtually what are
the barriers to that and how can you work through those now if your nonprofit
work involves outdoors work or something involving hunger or food distribution
what are the ways you can put safety protocols in place to allow volunteers
to still support you and keep things moving I know our local food bank has
done a great job of practicing safe and social socially distanced volunteering
while they're trying to keep up with the demand which is even greater right now
but the sixth and final tip that I have for you is probably the most important
one and it's kind of reiterating what I said before and that now is the time to
focus on your relationships and not just your relationships with your donors and
supporters and volunteers but also with your team members and your board and
just people in the community you can form new relationships right now one of
the silver linings of this whole situation is I think everyone feels this
we are feeling more connected emotionally than ever to
others we're realizing that we need each other we're trying to figure out how we
can help each other out we're checking in with each other so build on that form
those relationships so that they will last pass whatever is going to happen
next and you all can emerge from this stronger together that's all I got thank
you so much once again I'm amber Melanie Smith and I make these videos here on
YouTube fairly regularly hopefully I'll get back to once a week schedule don't
forget to Like and subscribe to this channel and of course share this video
with anyone who might find it useful thanks again and I'll see you next time