Are you in the process of starting a non-profit and wondering what it looks like to have a strong
start in your first year of operations? That's what we're going to talk about in this video!
Welcome or welcome back! My name is Amber Melanie Smith, and I'm a non-profit founder and executive
director and YouTuber who makes these videos to help out people who are trying to make a
difference through starting a non-profit, social Enterprise, or other method of creating a social
impact - you're all welcome here! I hope as always that you find this video and all of my content
useful and helpful in your own journey of creating an impact don't forget to give this video a like
to tell YouTube to share it with more people and to subscribe to my channel because I have a lot
more content like this okay and if you've seen some of my other videos you know that I have
a website FounderToFulltime.com where I have some online trainings for people starting a non
non-profit or developing a sustainable fundraising plan so definitely go check those out there.
All right let's get into our topic for today. Starting a non-profit is a lot - I've talked about
this in past videos there is a lot to do to get an organization successfully up and running and your
first year is a pretty important piece of this puzzle so I'm going to share a checklist of sorts
um several things that if you can do these in your first year of getting up and running as a
new non-profit you're going to be in really strong shape to grow effectively in the future and what
I mean by the first year of your operations is that period after you've received or or are in
the process of receiving your 501c3 status from the IRS and you've already gotten some of that
initial paperwork going oh and you have a board of directors in place of course or at least the start
of one enough to have filed your paperwork for for that charitable status okay so these things
are all things that if I saw an organization doing these things I would think to myself
yes that organization is starting very strong and I'd be pretty impressed so let's get into
this checklist now okay so I'm gonna share nine things and the first one that is on the checklist
for things strong organizations will do in their first year is collect Community feedback and
this is so important especially in year one but really all years of your organization's existence
because the world is changing you're changing your organization's organization is changing and you
always want to make sure that you are collecting as much information from your community especially
those that you're serving as possible so that you know you're always providing the best Services
possible to the community that is in fact why you wanted to start a non-profit in the first
place right so you've got to be collecting that Community feedback but there's a second part to
this and the second part to this thing that you've got to do is even harder than collecting the
feedback itself and that is this if the feedback is telling you that your way of doing things is
not quite cutting it is not quite meeting the community's needs or is not serving people in
the best way possible you and your leadership have to be open to pivoting to adjusting the way
that you're doing things until you can hit the mark and meet your goals to serve the community
this mindset of being willing to change if you're not quite hitting your goals or you're not quite
serving the community the best way it needs to be served is really important and we'll make sure
that you are operating in the most ethical um way possible as a non-profit the second thing strong
non-profits do in their first year is create a system to measure their results so we talked
about collecting Community feedback this one is a little bit different because what I'm talking
about is creating the actual processes needed to consistently track your progress towards your
mission and your goals over time so maybe it's designing a survey that you issue every quarter
maybe it is tracking the number of people that you serve in a spreadsheet or a database but whatever
it is it's creating a system that you and your leadership and future people that you possibly
employ as a non-profit can use is important in in year one is to create those systems
um and having that system in place is going to allow you to track your progress towards
your goals in that first year and having the measurements of your progress is going to help
you in turn attract donors and tell a great story of your impact to the public so this
is a really really key thing that I think a lot of newer organizations neglect to do in their
first year or two because it's just something that that is generally an afterthought all right item
number three that strong nonprofits do in their first year is establishing processes to grow
Their audience so a lot of establishing processes here on this list you're going to hear today but
um systems to grow your audience are really important because in this first year it's all
about getting the word out and if you go out and you do 20 speaking engagements and meet hundreds
of amazing people then you can feel good in your hearts that you know that you met some
great people and reached some people but if you haven't collected their contact information or
have any way of reaching them or keeping up with them then it's almost a missed opportunity because
maybe you inspired a bunch of those people you talked to but because you didn't set up a system
to collect their contact information and grow that audience you might never hear from them
again and they might not remember the name of your organization or the website and they might
not think to reach out to you so give them a way to opt in to receive more information
from you as early as possible one of the simplest ways of doing this is by creating a mailing list
there are lots of free services that are out there that you can use when you're just starting
out until you hit a certain subscriber count where you can be collecting email addresses
from people who are interested in learning more so let's say you're out at a bunch of speaking
events you can put a mailing list sign up sheet out of the event and allow people to give you
their email or their phone number so that you can stay in contact with them and maybe
one day they'll even become a volunteer or a donor the fourth thing that strong
nonprofits do in their first year of operations is develop a board of directors training process
so your board members are unless they have a ton of non-profit experience in the past
are likely new to a lot of things going on in the nonprofit world so you have to really uh develop
some trainings so that everyone can be as in the know and as skilled at running the non-profit
alongside you as possible there are three things in particular you want to make sure your board
is very well trained on the first is non-profit governance so make sure they know your bylaws make
sure they know how voting Works making sure they know about the policies that they will need to
develop over time to make sure your organization has really strong infrastructure going forward
the second thing is you really want your board of directors to become experts on your mission
so not just knowing and being able to memorize and say your mission statement but also understanding
the research uh behind the issue that your organization is tackling for example let's
say you are an organization that is combating homelessness well your board members should be
able to explain to any stranger that they meet on the street why homelessness exists why homeless
needs homelessness needs to be addressed the various ways that people are already addressing
homelessness and why they work or don't work and what your organization is doing to combat
homelessness in a way that is effective so they need to be knowledgeable about the cause that you
are serving and the third thing that board members really need to be well trained in is fundraising
this one is really hard because terrify people are terrified of fundraising oftentimes and that
includes lots of board members um but there are many ways to make it fun and easy to digest and
help them see all of the various ways that they can contribute their personal skills and talents
to fundraising in order to make it successful for your organization such as going out and
doing a speaking engagement where they're simply raising awareness about your cause because then
you know people who hear about your cause at that speaking engagement are going to sign up on your
mailing list and then you're going to be able to communicate with them and then maybe over some
time they'll become donors so because that board member did that speaking engagement you now have
donor in the future lots of different ways to think about it anyway those are the three things
you're going to want to make sure to have board trainings on the fifth thing strong nonprofits
will do in their first year of operations is start to create some systems for proper accounting and
bookkeeping you want to be keeping every single receipt and scanning it and logging it and if you
can afford some kind of basic accounting software like QuickBooks or there are plenty of them out
there invest in it early because the more quickly you can show smooth accounting processes and are
able to demonstrate how you're spending money effectively the more quickly you're going to
be able to attract donors but the other thing is the IRS can audit your organization anytime
they want and if you don't have the bookkeeping up to date you could be in trouble so you want
to make sure that you have those systems in place and that you're protected from audits
the sixth thing that strong nonprofits have in common in their first year is a vision for how
they're going to grow and this is in two different ways the first way is your program outcomes maybe
you're going to serve 10 people this this year but your vision is to serve 20 people
next year and 30 years 30 people the year after that so having that Vision that strategic goal
um that you work together with your fellow board members knowing where you're going as
an organization is something really important for planning your path out the second way you
want to have a vision is in your fundraising so let's say you know what your program outcomes
are going to be you want to serve 10 then 20 then 30 people well as you increase the number
of people you serve of course you're going to need more resources in order to serve them so
how much will it cost to serve 20 people than 30 people and so forth you get the idea and that's
your fundraising goal you want to make sure that that or more so that you can put aside
a reserve as well is part of your fundraising strategy for the next couple of years but the
basic Point here is that a strong organization will be not just thinking about the day-to-day
but be thinking strategically about the next couple of years ahead alright item number seven
speaking of fundraising is that your organization if strong in the first year of operations will
identify not one but at least two to four different possible revenue streams for your
organization's Financial growth so you never want to put as they say all of your eggs in one basket
the same is true for fundraising but especially if you are a start up non-profit organization
you are in a stage where you're putting feelers out you're figuring out what fundraising methods
are going to work best for you how are you going to best raise the money that you need in the most
efficient way possible to serve your mission so um a lot of startups will have multiple revenue
streams whether it's different events or building up your individual donor base or possibly some
grants though those can be very competitive as I've talked about in other videos earned
income revenue streams there are so many ways that non-profits can generate Revenue I encourage you
to check out some of my other videos especially my video called um something like weighs that
non-profits can raise money because there are a lot so just be thinking about the diverse revenue
streams you're going to have in your startup years as a strong non-profit the eighth thing
strong nonprofits have in their first year is a unified brand presence so you've got your name
of the organization of course but you want to make sure you have a domain name for your website and
social media handles that all match the same name same spelling the goal here is to make it as easy
as possible for strangers to find you so that they can support your cause and remember it it's
really hard to find an organization if they're spelled their their various handles are spelled
different ways in different places and you're not quite sure if it's them or not so making
sure it's all unified and comprehensive and the ninth and final way that nonprofits can be strong
in their first years to think about how they can effectively partner with other organizations
and by other organizations I mean other non-profits I also mean businesses places of
faith in your community schools Etc there are so many different ways that organizations can
partner with each other and I've seen and observed that when they do it well it can really grow not
just your organization but both organizations audience and resources so thinking about who
might be a good partner there's an organization I know of that provides clothing for children so
when they serve a family they might also identify that that same family has a need for food so they
partner with another organization that can provide the food and together those two organizations are
serving many needs for that family so that's just one example all right so if you're in
the non-profit startup phase how are you feeling about all this hopefully not too overwhelmed these
things are definitely achievable and are just so helpful if you can get these things established
in your first year you will be very happy with yourself in years two and three because you'll
have the strongest Foundation possible for Success so share more about how you're feeling
and what areas that I talked about do you feel like you're excelling in and which ones do you
think you might need a little bit of extra work on uh share in the comments below because I'm
really curious as I mentioned before if you are starting a non-profit or developing a sustainable
fundraising plan I have online trainings at my website FounderToFulltime.com so you can
check those out there I also have a newsletter for non-profit leaders and change makers of all
kinds the link to subscribe to that is in the description and finally I have a Facebook group
called Change the World or Bust we've got people in there from all over the world talking about
the great work that they're doing so come join us there that's all I have for you today I'm
Amber Melanie Smith and I hope that you found this video helpful as always. See you next time, bye!