Please know that we say this with love. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Because it's the organizations that get really confusing when every five minutes they get tired of not waiting for something to hit or you don't get enough likes. Tne then they change the messaging. And it becomes utterly confusing to the supports and donors who casually follow you. Your hard core supports might understand it, but the majority of your casual observers are going to go, what the hell are you guys doing now? What is this?” Get consistent. And here's the thing. And this is one of my favorite things that was ever talked to mea bout anything marketing is the minute you are bored with the messaging, everyone else. isjust catching on. – Patrick Kirby

In this episode, I talk to Patrick Kirby, the founder of Do Good Better Consulting and the author of the Amazon bestseller Fundraise Awesomer!: A practical guide to staying safe while doing good. Patrick is also the host of the Official Do Good Better Podcast and the believer of ‘we have always done it this way’ is the most dangerous phrase in the English language. Patrick has worked as a fundraiser in the non-profit industry for 15 years and always tries to do good better every day. Join us as we share about Giving Tuesday and learn more about building a base of new donors, creating fundraising messages, and how people could use Giving Tuesday to reengage lapsed donors.

What you will hear in this episode:

• What Giving Tuesday is
• Building a base of new donors
• Why you need to repeat the fundraising message
• The advantage of Giving Tuesday

Want to skip ahead? Here are some key takeaways

[05:44] What Giving Tuesday is. It’s the Tuesday after Thanksgiving Day where all nonprofit troops are rallied in one moment as a marketing opportunity while giving while doing the most good.
[09:30] How people could use Giving Tuesday to reengage lapsed donors. This day gives a perfect opportunity to reach out to donors you haven’t heard from in a while by giving the momentum and the platform to build the conversation.
[17:30] Building a base of new donors. If it’s friend-raising, don’t as for a lot. If it’s fundraising, you can reach out to some of your sponsors to donate.
[25:17] Episode Summary. Try something new and see what happens and don’t be afraid if it doesn’t work out. People need to hear things over and over again. Use the same campaign and just add a few necessary updates.
[30:48] The beauty of Giving Tuesday. You don’t need to create a separate campaign every other time. 

Resources

EP 94 | Starting Conversations with Patrick Kirby

Full Transcript

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Hey, Hey everybody, Sami here with another episode of the Digital Marketing Therapy Podcast. And today we are talking about Giving Tuesday. So I know it's only October. But just bear with me it is never too early to plan for Giving Tuesday. And as you've heard me say, in a lot of these episodes, I really want to get you guys to a place where you have the ability to actually enjoy the holidays, and enjoy the end of the year, and still have really successful urine campaigns and Giving Tuesday campaigns. So that's why I brought Patrick Kirby on today. He's been on the podcast before. But I'm excited to have him back today to talk with you about Giving Tuesday ways to think about it, how to re-engage with your audience. And so we have a great conversation. You might remember Patrick from Episode 94, where we talked about conversations and making asks so definitely something you'll want to revisit after this episode after you listen to this episode. But we have a great conversation about getting Tuesday, ways to think about the campaign, how to set your goals, and how to really take action and get the thing done. And you could even get it done right after you listen to this episode. It's pretty quick. It's down and dirty. And just kind of a great reminder of how to simplify our fundraising experiences so that you can see results and you can see growth year over year. Patrick Kirby is the founder of Do Good Better Consulting, author of the Amazon bestseller fundraiser, A Practical Guide to staying sane while doing good. Host of the official Do Good  Better podcast and believer that we've always done it this way. It's the most dangerous phrase in the English language. Patrick has spent nearly 15 years working as a fundraiser in the nonprofit industry for organizations of all shapes and sizes and strives to do good better every day from organizing $10,000 cure walks to a $1 million Gala. Patrick's passion lies in creating creative solutions to make fundraising less boring. Patrick married out of his league to his wife Shannon has three ridiculously adorable children named Spencer precedent Willow and lives in West Fargo, North Dakota. I love it. Another Midwesterner I really think you guys are gonna enjoy this episode. Make sure like we mentioned at the end that you tag us in your Giving Tuesday campaign so we can shout you out. I appreciate you all and the work that you're doing. So let's get into this episode. 

But before we do, this episode is brought to you by our patrons. Thank you to all of our patrons who have joined us. We appreciate you being listeners and participating. If you want to become a patron head on over to thefirstclick.net/patreon. But we have some great benefits and perks. For those of you that are patrons including worksheets that help walk through the elements that you're learning about all of our episodes. Each month, we have different Q and A's that are available exclusively to our patrons, discounts on our products and services, all sorts of things. So head on over check it out. And you know, take action on the things don't just listen and think oh, that's a great idea. But when you hear an episode that's really hitting you where you are right now, it's a great way for you to then take action on it and continue to move forward in sustainability and growth in your organization. So head on over to thefirstclick.net/patreon. Check it out. But let's get into the episode. 

[Intro] You're listening to the digital marketing therapy podcast. I'm your host, Sammy del mulhern. And each week, I bring you tips from myself and other experts, as well as hot seats with small business owners and entrepreneurs to demystify digital marketing and get you on your way to generating more leads and growing your business.

 Hey, everybody, join me in welcoming Patrick Kirby back to the podcast. Patrick, thanks for coming back again.

[Patrick Kirby] I liked it so much the first time that I enthusiastically said yes, for round number two. Thanks for having me.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yes. And we have your previous episode queued up in the show notes. So check that out when we talk about giving and asking for gifts. But today we're talking about Giving Tuesday. Right? So I would love to just kick it off with kind of what are your thoughts, experiences, feelings, all the things around Giving Tuesday? Why do you think it's such a cool movement? 

[Patrick Kirby] I think it's a neat movement because it rallies all of our nonprofit troops into one momentous marketing opportunity. Not a lot of times where you get everybody on the same page. Hey, let's get as many people as we possibly can to give as much money as they possibly can and do the most good in the shortest period of time. And that's why Giving data in these pure forms are phenomenal. Now there are some pitfalls you want to avoid. And there are some things that will give you a sort of a leg up on the competition, but a leg up on others who are sort of vying for dollars. But overall, if you've got this as part of your complete fundraising strategy to participate in something like this, you'll be really surprised at the amount of brand new names that will sort of be added to your list. And really just sort of this wonderful, enthusiastic, momentous day that you can build upon for the rest of the year.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yes, there are so many things that you kind of suggested in there that I'm excited about. But for people that don't know what Giving Tuesday is, before we kind of jump into that it is the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. So this year, that falls on November 30. This podcast goes live on October 20. So as this goes live, you have a little over a month to kind of get your plans in order. So that's why we wanted to put this out. But um, why is it not too early to start planning for GivingTuesday? Because you mentioned pitfalls. And I think one of the biggest pitfalls is that people don't treat it with the time and energy to kind of make an impactful campaign for their organization. 

[Patrick Kirby] Well, I think a lot of people use this as a, well, we'll just put our name out there. And it'll be fun. If we get some stuff, we'll get some stuff, right, I think that's, it's fine if that's what you're going to do. But to be really successful on a given day, like Giving Tuesday is you have to put some thoughtful and purposeful effort behind it. This is just another event in your arsenal. So you have to treat it like a gala, or a wine event or a walk, or a bowl of fun, you have to do some heavy lifting prior to in order to maximize your day. So what I mean by that is, it's a great time to call your donors and say thanks for all the support they've given over the past couple of months or the past year, and say, Hey, we're so excited to participate in this year in Giving Tuesday, it's another opportunity for those who support our organization to give as much as they can to continue the awesome programs and services that we provide. That sets you up then to make a formal ask, either the day before or the day, I have to say, Hey, listen, I know we talked about this a little bit earlier, today's the day we're really excited, we're going to leverage everyone in our network to give as much as they can, we hope we can count on you too. But a lot of that work happens prior to the event if nobody knows that you're participating and like nobody's gonna give you on a given Tuesday. So it's like any other event if nobody knows you having a gala. And you come the day of the gala and say, Hey, we can't wait to see what the gala was like, why didn't get shoes and I didn't get a dress and I didn't get a babysitter, I don’t have like, anybody is going to come. So it's the same principle that you have to treat with any other event that you have on your calendar, to at least spend some time curating and building momentum so that your day of is very successful.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] I agree. And one of the things that I love about Giving Tuesday is that I mean, you work a lot with events and kind of offline giving. I work a lot in online giving. And it's one of those few things that you can do for your organization where you can encompass all of that like you can really have a multifaceted approach and really hit everybody where they're at. And there are not very many elements in your fundraising where you can do that.

[Patrick Kirby] If you wanted an inclusive campaign where everybody of any capacity can give money and resources and enthusiasm and momentum, giving Tuesday's exactly that. Because no matter if you've got $50,000 or 50 box or anything in between, you can still participate and Giving Tuesday, which means you don't have to dress up and you don't have to get a babysitter for this event, you can just do this from the comfort of your own home own chair on your phone. And anyone in your donor database or anyone who supports your organization can do this. And it's traditional people who, you know, sometimes only write checks, or maybe it's somebody who just finds you on the internet and finds your story very compelling. This is a time where anybody can be a donor and a supporter of your organization.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yeah, so let's talk about your existing donor base. And let's talk about specifically maybe your lapsed donor. So how could people maybe use Giving Tuesday because you talked about you know, the beauty of this, I think is it's more about the masses coming together and giving whatever they can as opposed to like going out and asking for those, you know, 510 $100,000 gifts, right? So how could this be a great way to reengage lapsed donors?

[Patrick Kirby] Well, that's exciting. Where you want to use this event as an opportunity, you want to take a look at your year of giving. And you want to compare it to last year's year of giving. And you want to find the donors who haven't given to you this year, but have given to you in previous years, the year last year, but not this year donors. If you're a fundraising dork like I am, they'll probably come up in conversations like a live Bundt list. But it's only your last year, but not this year’s donors. So, anyone who hasn't given to you this year, it's a wonderful opportunity to say, Hey, we miss you, we love you. And there's a wonderful opportunity for you to give to your favorite cause of ours in a really convenient and easy and safe way. This gives you an excuse to reach out to individuals who you haven't heard from in a while. And it gives you some momentum to help build a win. have conversations. So what you don't want to do is just go in cold, Hey, can you give us money? That's not a bit right. We don't even know why they stopped giving you or forgot to give you in the first place. So this is why it's so important to go back to our previous bit of a conversation was you have to do some research and some digging in some touchpoints prior to this event to figure out where they went, why they stopped giving, did you reach out and say thank you, did you talk to them about the impact that their gifts have made over the last year, and are they interested in continuing that support. So that's your first line of order. And now that you've got that at least connection, and now you can set the table up for saying, Hey, if you're considering giving again, this year, we got a wonderful opportunity, we're participating in Giving Tuesday, and that gives you again, the reason to pick up the phone. Not that you should have a reason to pick up the phone, you should pick up the phone anyway. But if you need a reason, this is a wonderful one. 

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yeah, maybe it might make you more comfortable to have fun. Um, what I think is great about this is, um, so you could have a bunch of gifts already kind of pre-orchestrated before. So you could go into Giving Tuesday saying we've already raised X amount of dollars for Giving Tuesday for our organization to help us hit our goal of whatever that dollar amount is. Um, but once you kind of reached out to your lapsed donors, and maybe you do a similar thing with your current donors. You know, the next thing for me, at least focusing on online stuff is having that secondary ask in the background, that's like, Okay, great, thank you so much, we so appreciate your gift, would you love to double or triple it by doing an online fundraiser via Facebook for us because we know that Facebook in the past, we can't guarantee what they're going to do this year. But in the past, Facebook has definitely shown up during Giving Tuesday to recoup the costs that they usually charge for credit card processing and things like that. So that's a great follow-up to say, Well, you could also triple your gift if you do a fundraiser for $100 and try to get your friends to give. So there are so many ways to kind of piggyback then on that initial contribution. Or if they say, well, we just can't give it this time. Well, that's totally fine. We understand. But would you mind then doing this, so it kind of has a way of still generating funds for you Even if you get a no.

[Patrick Kirby] It's such a great point. This gives you continuous opportunities to have them say yes to something. So you never want them to say no, I'm not interested, they're probably interested in something they picked up the phone, they know who you are. And they know that you're trying to ask for money. So whether they can do fundraisers for you on your behalf, right without necessarily, you know, giving, giving all of the gifts that they could give, but they could go out and get their friends to give 20 box apiece, get five friends, the 100 box. And that's the that's an easy win. But what you also said was interesting is that you could double or triple This is a wonderfully great opportunity to reach out to really awesome supporters of yours or individuals who may be having the capacity to give a ton of money or a little bit more than others, and then collect a matching gift people that they used to get their gifts matched. And if you had, let's just hypothetically, let's use $1,000, right, depending on the size of your organization, 1000 might be a lot. If you have two or three donors who would be willing to pool their money together as a matching gift challenge. Now you can go back to your last year but not this year’s donors and saying hey, we've done our due diligence to go reach out to some of our most fantastic donors and they have given us $1,000 to match your gift dollar for dollar up to that amount. Would you consider giving now you've got a reason in addition to just supporting your great cause, a reason to think okay, well now my money is, quote-unquote, doubled? Well now if they go and do a fundraiser on their behalf, or your behalf and they raised maybe $200. That means that 200 turns into 400, they feel extra awesome about themselves. And now you know that about that donor. So when the event is done, you can say, Hey, I just want to let you know that your $200 Facebook campaign that was matched dollar for dollar up to, you know, the $200. That came to $400. And that's what this did in your community because of you. So you have taken somebody who may not have given to you yet this year, you've activated them because you've encouraged through a matching gift challenge or given them an alternative to just giving you money alone. And they're having their friends to be on board because again that that third-party endorsement is really important. And then you get to turn around and say, your efforts were not only doubled. But this is what happened, the empowerment you made was this program got expanded, are you fed these people or you, you housed these people you saved and rescued these puppies? You go right back to them and say, your gift, did this? It's amazing.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] And I think that quick turnaround of like I gave money. And then now this happened, like that good feeling, especially around the holidays just like escalates. And who knows, then, you know, with the annual giving appeal letter or year-end appeal letter, like what that could potentially turn into your point. We don't know why they didn't give this year. Was it because they didn't have the funds? Was it because we didn't reach out to them? Was it because we didn't have a compelling enough story. So you know, it's not too late to kind of be that organization that is really upfront honest and sharing kind of all of the amazing things that you're doing?

[Patrick Kirby] Yeah, it will, it's gonna force you to sort of coming up with, hey, this dollar amount is going to do this, this and this. Hmm. So if you don't have that at the ready, if you don't, if somebody comes up to you and asks you, hey, what is $100? Do it to your organization, you don't have that at the ready. Well, how are you going to justify making an ask? Well, this event and this sort of online giving platform and this encouragement globally, are going to force your hand into really monetizing some of the awesome impacts that you're making. And now this, you can use that same talking point for the rest of the year.  

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yeah. Well, I want to go back to something you mentioned at the beginning, briefly, which was like, you know, what's the purpose? Is it brand awareness? Is that money? What is it and so I think the other beauty behind Giving Tuesday, is just using whatever you can like getting people to get as many people in the door even if it's a $1 donation or a $5 donation so that you can build that base of new donors that you can continue to nurture and make happy. So kind of what are your thoughts on really the process for how you go around? Why are you doing this? And what are your goals because there can be multiple different goals for this kind of an

[Patrick Kirby] I usually go with two and that makes sense to simplify it, it's friend-raising your fundraiser. So if it's friend-raising, don't ask for a lot, just ask for a little just to get involved and give them that sort of Sally Struthers, like the amount of money, you know, the dollar a day helps whatever. Yeah, and that's and that's really for cultivating individuals to get on your mailing list so that they fall in love with your organization a little more than just love at first sight moment. Right? A lot of people who give on giving days are doing it in the heat of the moment. They don't necessarily know everything about what you do. But you'd love to tell them and you just don't have a lot of time or you don't know who is in your donor database are in your supporter groups that that would be interested in knowing a little bit better, if somebody gives you money, that is a fiscally that's a fiscal way of saying, Hey, I'm interested in what you do, or I like what you're doing. That's giving you the permission to say, hey, thanks. This is what your gift has done to begin that donor relationship. So if it's a little bit of an amount, it might be a test gift. I don't know what these people do with my money, but I'm going to give them a little bit because I like their video. I like their story. I like the ask whatever the case may be. This gives you then an opportunity to follow up, ask some pointed questions, some really good and interesting probing questions on why they gave in the first place. And if they seem like a good fit, maybe a coffee date, maybe a zoom call, whatever, to build that rapport for a larger gift down the road. Now if your only purpose is to fundraise when you get into that matching gift component now you can be very purposeful with reaching out to some of your sponsors to say hey, maybe you want to sort of build momentum through the day and activate some people who haven't been really interested in what you did well get a sponsor to donate their gift on that day to help you raise your goal or keep building momentum. So there's a ton of different unique ways or you know having a mini-event or a something a THON that helps sort of Create another mode of momentum that you can go back to your donors and say, Hey, listen, we're doing this, we're doing this, we want you to join that fear of FOMO is a very palatable thing that you want to get involved in, especially on social media, with people who follow and like you and want to hear more about the content that you make.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Well, that's the beauty of Giving Tuesday is I think, setting some sort of goal for your organization for that day, and having that time sensitivity, that urgency, so people are like, Okay, we got to get it done on this day. Um, I also think that getting and getting those plans in place as soon as possible, because it is right after Thanksgiving. So you don't want to be making those asks, and having conversations that week when kids are home from school families are I mean, it's just Thanksgiving is a stressful, emotional holiday. And so I think the sooner the better, that you can get these plans in place and have everything locked and loaded. So that way that Monday, after Thanksgiving, it's just some final follow-up calls. And then things are kind of rocking and rolling, which can really help set you up for success.

[Patrick Kirby] Exactly. And then again, if it's something that the kids can help you with, if they're already home, right, this might be a really fun opportunity to get their kids involved in any way that you can get the family involved, well, then it becomes a family piece of pride, we're going to give this money that we would have normally spent on presence this year to this organization. And that's our gift to each other. But a wonderful way to show somebody how much they care about them is by giving an honor to a group that they both love. Head over heels about. So that's a really fun way to do it. But again, more to your point, do all of the work you possibly can prior to the day so you can enjoy what you see coming through rather than stressing about how much that you're not raising because you never set clear goals and your expectations. was too crazy. And you really didn't talk to anybody about this. You're just hoping that people find you on the internet, which I don't know if you've noticed lately, the internet is very huge. Yeah, it's hard to find people and to make sure that you are the cream of the crop, right right. At the top, you want to make sure that you're doing your due diligence to have people talk about your organization or post about the gifts that you that they have made. So that there's this organic build in content throughout the interwebs that allow other eyeballs to go, why didn't know you supported this organization. I'll click here and see what they got going on. 

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] So let's talk about that for a minute. Because it's all about making it easy for the people that you're asking to do the action to take that action. So prior to even having these conversations are kind of once you figured out, well, this is what our goals are, this is what we want to have happened. This is what we're going to communicate, creating those assets for folks so that when you do have those conversations, it's like, Hey, will you do a Facebook fundraiser for us on Giving Tuesday? Here are the images, here's the copy, here's everything you need. Like, that's critical, I think, to your point of how do we separate ourselves from other organizations that are doing this so that people support us? Or choose to support us?

[Patrick Kirby] Yes. And being able to use and reuse that content going forward? I think a lot of people will use giving heart or giving a Tuesday here as an opportunity to like, okay, we're going to try something new. That's great. I love that. But a lot of organizations will use that same talking point, the same messaging, and the same things they're funding for, for their end-of-year appeal, which comes incomes a little bit later in December. Well, now you're talking about the same thing for a longer period of time. And as you know, in the marketing world, how many times do you have to hear something over and over and over again, to have it stick into your brain. So if you are continuously raising funds for the same thing, that message that you're using on giving heart stay can be the same message you use on the end-of-year appeal, or your last-second letter, or your social media going forward. It's just taking the GivingTuesday logo off, it's putting yours back on it's doing like it's it's a lot easier to create one thing and then use it in multiple different places, which is talking about the same thing too. And then yeah, you're not confusing anybody. And that's a really fun advantage to play around with Giving Tuesday, or as I said earlier, this is a really fun and easy way to experiment with something that you didn't know would work. And you use Giving Tuesday as an experiment to some of your talking points to some of your artwork to some of the programs that you might have a need to fund or that are underfunded. So you can take it either way. And that is the advantage of being creative. And using some of these online assets, and then providing them to your donors and supporters is even have fun with them. You'll be purposeful with it. And it just depends on what direction you want to go. 

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Okay, so I think this entire podcast could be summed up in what you just said, and I don't want to gloss over this, because I think you said too huge things. So I want you guys to listen. Number one, try something new. See what happens. Don't be afraid if it fails, or it doesn't. This is a short-term campaign. And no matter what you're going to learn something about what your audience likes, or doesn't like. So that alone, genius. But I think the more important thing that you said was, people, need to hear things over and over again, and use the same campaign over and over again, and just add the GivingTuesday or add the year-end appeal. So people are saying to themselves, well, then I'm saying the same thing to my audience, and they're gonna get bored, they're gonna say, well, we already heard this, and you're gonna end now we're gonna, like, you know, not have anything new. And people are going to be frustrated with us that we're sending the same message. And thoughts on that I know my thoughts. But I just love for you to really drag this point home because I think it's crucial.

[Patrick Kirby] First of all, I've never experienced a donor going, this is the same thing you fundraise for all the time. Yes, that's what your organization does is fundraisers for this thing. So yeah, that's you have to do the same thing over and over again, you have to talk about it. Now, if you're very worried about that, then change the impact stories, change the names of the people, and the things that you're doing to impact. It doesn't change the ask, it just changes, and another person or another family was positively impacted by the same thing that we're finding over and over again, please know that we say this with love, repeat, repeat, repeat, because it's the, it's the organizations that get really confusing. When they every five minutes, they get tired of not waiting for something to hit, or they don't get enough likes, and then they change the messaging. And it becomes utterly confusing to the supporters and donors who casually follow you, your hardcore supporters might understand it, but the majority of your casual observers are going to go What the hell are you guys doing now? What is this? Yes, get consistent with it. And here's the thing. And this is one of my favorite things that was ever talked to me about anything marketing is, the minute you're bored with the messaging, everyone else is just catching on.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] I was just gonna say that. Yes, that's one of my favorite lines, too, because it's so true.

[Patrick Kirby] And it's so hard. I know. It's I listen, as somebody who has undiagnosed three letter things going on at all times, I understand the absolute need to change at a moment's notice. I have an entrepreneur’s brain, I feel like I go to like 90% of things. And I go am bored of that. The only thing that you should be sticking with is your messaging, messaging, messaging, do not get and do not give up on what you do, and the importance of your impact. And don't, don't give it up for doing something that's super cool and awesome at the moment, and forego, really what got you here in the first place. And what people love about your organization, hammer that home. Again, you can use a Giving Tuesday logo and an end-of-year logo as far as sort of sprucing things up, but keep the message the same. 

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] I love it. And I just I want you to maybe if this point doesn't stick in your head, and you're like, whatever my audience listens to everything I say, number one, you're in denial. But number two, just think about yourself, and pay attention to how many times I know this comes up in conversation our family all the time like Oh, hey, I just saw this Tick-tock, I couldn't tell you the name of the person. But it was like about this like you remember the context, you remember the way that it made you feel. But you don't remember the super specifics of the detail or like, Hey, I just saw this ad on Facebook for this thing that I really want to try out. And now I can't find it. And you literally can't find the product anywhere you try to search for it. You can't figure it out. This happened to me the other day when I was trying to buy a new backpack because I found one that I really loved. And then I remembered the features. But I couldn't remember the rest of it for the life of me. So if you just start to kind of pay attention to that and your brain as you maneuver through just your consumerism, you'll realize you're not being beat over the head with things you don't remember the specific so the more that you talk about the same messaging, the better and like you said, the clearer it is you don't want to look like an organization that is changing every five seconds. 

[Patrick Kirby] There's a reason why the world goes up in arms when somebody like a coke or a Pepsi or a Nike changes something about what they did, right? Because you're like, What on earth is this? What are they doing? It's because this is what They do, right. And so any deviation from it the world goes bonkers. And they only talk about the change. They don't talk about the product, right? That consistent. The reason they're consistently the fortune one, or 10 companies is because they don't change the narrative. Right? That just how long has just done it then a Nike slogan? Right? forever? Right? It didn't stop when Michael Jordan retired, it continued. When LeBron James took over as the Alec it hasn't changed. So it regardless of who is at the head, the messaging, and you're the pitch on your impact doesn't clear on it. Yeah, 

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Well, let's bring this back to Giving Tuesday because I think the beauty of this is that you don't need to create a completely separate campaign like you're what you're saying is really just making it easier. So it's more of just about, okay, so we want to raise X amount of dollars, or we want to bring X amount of new people into our world, during Giving Tuesday, here are the mechanisms, we're going to do it, we already have the messaging all pulled together, let's just figure out how to communicate it to our donors, let's pull some reports from our lapsed donors and give them an easy way to re-engage with us. And so it really takes the complexity out of what Giving Tuesday is,

[Patrick Kirby] and what's the biggest hurdle that fundraisers have is that they make life too complicated. Yeah, they're trying to come up with a brand new thing, when really, it's about storytelling, and aligning somebody with if they really like what you do, and then making an ask, those three things are the only thing you should be doing and storytelling. And so going back to Giving Tuesday, what are you doing, you have a new platform, to tell a story and find people who are aligned and you give them away to give. That's it. That's fundraising in a nutshell. And again, anyone who's trying to make it more complicated or telling you that it's like, as to ease like that's their liers because that's really what you need to do is tell stories, make sure the person you're chatting with is aligned, make an ask.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] And the only thing that I would add to that in this particular situation is to make it easy for them. Like the Ask isn't just about the dollar, but make it easy for them to share it and make it simple for them to handhold. Give them the graphics make it super easy. I feel like we could talk about some of this stuff all day long. Yes. But I want to make sure that you guys get off this episode and go start to put the things together and just get it done.

[Patrick Kirby] And here's, here's the thing, if you are getting off this podcast, you're like, Okay, what do I need to do now to do to get ready for Giving Tuesday, run your last year, but not this year list people who gave to you last year who haven't given to you yet this year. That's the first thing you do. The second thing you do is make a social media post that has the Giving Tuesday logo on it with the other stuff that you've been talking about this entire year or call Sammy, and she'll help you out on this. Probably do first is call her there first. And then start making phone calls to say thank you to donors, and saying we can't wait to participate in Giving Tuesday, we hope you can join us. That's the three things you can do now, so that when you get closer to Giving Tuesday, and it seems like you're you're turning a corner with momentum building, switch it up, ask for some major gifts, get some money in advance, get some pledged gifts, have people do campaigns, but the simple thing is to get your list, build your materials and start making phone calls.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] I love it. Okay. And, um, I think really just making sure you have your goal set. That's the only thing you didn't add in there. Make sure you know exactly what your goals are. So you know what your target is. And because nonprofits are also notoriously bad at celebrating their wins, so that way it gives you something to celebrate and feel good about. Exactly. Love anything else about Giving Tuesday, Patrick, that you want to make sure to throw out there.

[Patrick Kirby] Have fun with it. Yes. Hey, don't do it. Again. This is not gonna make or break your budget. If it does, you've got some serious issues. But yeah, have fun with this. This is another opportunity that you have to reach out to donors, to talk with donors to celebrate a big win, to get people involved, and to tell your story, and that right there is super fun. If you don't think that's fun. Well, then I think you might be in the wrong business.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yeah, I agree with that. Patrick, if people want to find out more about you and your business, how do they do that?

[Patrick Kirby] Sure. You can go to dogoodbetterconsulting.com and find all of our fun stuff there and what we got going on and free training and free videos and a whole bunch of downloadable stuff or find us on Facebook. You can find us on Twitter at fundraising dad I think we're on Instagram at fundraising Dad, I think we're on TickTock fundraising dad. I think we do TickTock now. So we're all over the place. Find us on LinkedIn. Say hi, any questions, drop me a line. And you'll find us. We're all over the place.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Well, Patrick, thank you so much for joining me, I always appreciate you coming on and sharing your insights. And again, make sure you check out the show notes, we'll link up some additional episodes, including the one that Patrick was on before about making an ask, which might also help you with his task list for you for Giving Tuesday. And we'd love to hear what campaigns you guys have. So make sure you tag us both and that we can help shout you out as well.

[Patrick Kirby] I love it. Hey, thanks again for the ask for being on always an awesome time.

[Sami Bedell-Mulhern] Yeah, of course. And we'll see on social media, we'll have to check out on Tick tock, you're braver than I. 

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to Patrick. I always love having conversations with him around fundraising. It's so much fun to kind of really create the online-offline experience for folks. So I hope that you'll do the easy steps that he mentioned. Take action and get your Giving Tuesday campaign off and running. I can't wait to see what you come up with. But for now, make sure you subscribe so you don't miss out on a single episode. Hit us up at the first click marketing on Facebook and Instagram. And we'll see you in the next episode.