Tag: branding

How to Incorporate Storytelling Into Nonprofit Events

  • Event Management
  • EventUp Planner Contributor
  • November 1, 2024

Whether you’re hosting an in-person, virtual, or hybrid event, your nonprofit’s fundraising events rely on audience engagement to succeed. Your engagement approach likely focuses on participants—after all, you’ll only hit your fundraising goal if they register for the event and have a good time! However, you also need to consider your volunteers and sponsors since they make your event possible in the first place.

One strategy you can use to engage all of these audiences is storytelling. Stories allow your supporters to connect emotionally with your nonprofit and picture everything that will be possible through your event. This includes bringing your community together, creating a positive experience, and—most importantly—furthering your organization’s mission.

In this guide, we’ll review how to tell nonprofit stories that showcase social impact before discussing ways to incorporate storytelling into your events. Let’s dive in!

Fundamentals of Nonprofit Storytelling

Nonprofit storytelling overlaps somewhat with the fictional stories you’re likely familiar with (novels, movies, TV shows, etc.). However, there are also some notable differences because you’re telling true stories about real people, and instead of entertaining readers, your purpose is to inspire support for your mission.

Include the following elements in all of your nonprofit’s stories:

  • A compelling protagonist. If you choose someone your organization serves as the main character, it allows audiences to put a face to your work, making these stories particularly moving. You may also focus on supporters in some stories since they’re the most relatable main characters to most audiences, but these stories are most resonant when you use first-person testimonials in them.
  • A complete plot. Your story should have a beginning, middle, and end so your audience can follow it easily. Start by explaining a problem the main character faced, show how your organization stepped in to help them solve the problem, and end on a joyful or hopeful note.
  • A call to action. After you tell a story, clarify the next steps for your audience—such as registering for your event, volunteering, or staying involved afterward—and share tools and resources to make it easy for them to take action.

Depending on the storytelling format you choose, relevant images and concrete data can ground your stories in reality and tie them to your mission more effectively. Just remember to be truthful and transparent when using statistics, and always get consent from subjects before using their photos or names in your communications.

Telling Stories for Nonprofit Events

Every stage of planning and executing an event holds opportunities for your nonprofit to incorporate storytelling. Let’s break down these possibilities based on whether you tell each story before, during, or after the event.

Before

Since registration is likely one of your main priorities before your events, the main place to tell stories is in your marketing content. Get supporters excited about attending your event and giving to your cause with stories about what previous events have accomplished and your mission-related plans for the near future that you’ll use the funds from this event to achieve.

Infuse storytelling into all of your event marketing materials, including:

  • Your website. According to social impact agency Loop, “A great nonprofit website should inspire visitors and guide them towards the various actions they can take.” Create a webpage for each event you host, draw visitors in with a story, explain key logistical details, and link to your registration form. Using event software like EventUp Planner ensures that designing and maintaining your event website is hassle-free. 
  • Social media. Add a relevant story to your Facebook Event description, and alternate primarily informational and storytelling-based posts across all platforms in the lead-up to your event. Also, if your event includes a peer-to-peer component, encourage participants to share their own stories about their involvement with your nonprofit on their individual fundraising pages.
  • Email and direct mail. Stories are also great attention grabbers for these more personalized event invitations sent to individual supporters. Keep in mind that people are more likely to read longer content on paper than on a screen, so email stories should be concise, while those in direct mail can be more expansive.

Don’t forget about your sponsor and volunteer audiences in your pre-event storytelling strategy! Requests for event volunteer signups are another great place to use the email and direct mail techniques above. Plus, Winspire recommends including stories about your nonprofit’s impact in letters to potential event sponsors to demonstrate your credibility—a key factor for many businesses in deciding how to direct their corporate social responsibility efforts.

During

Storytelling during events keeps participants engaged and excited to support your mission. This holds true whether they’re in the room with you or attending virtually, and no matter if they’re enjoying a fancy gala dinner or challenging themselves to keep moving for twelve straight hours at a dance marathon.

Consider telling stories in:

  • Event kick-off and wrap-up speeches by your nonprofit’s leaders, board members, sponsors, or grateful recipients of your services.
  • Educational and breakout sessions during events like conferences, webinars, or panel discussions.
  • Attendee information packets, which should include an “About the Organization” page to keep your event’s purpose top of mind throughout it.

If you have guest speakers or outside professionals helping you with any of these event components, ensure everyone is on the same page about aligning all stories with your nonprofit branding guidelines and the aforementioned best practices for nonprofit storytelling.

After

Once your event ends, keep your audiences up-to-date on its impact by sharing stories about what you’ve been able to accomplish. If you have relevant stories ready to go within 48 hours of your event, you can also include them in your thank-you messages (since time is of the essence when expressing gratitude!).

Choose different impact stories for each audience based on what resonates with them—here are some ideas:

  • Participants will most want to know how their fundraising dollars allowed you to serve your community, whether you tell them about the new cats your animal shelter took in after expanding its facility or share testimonials from the new beach cleanup efforts your environmental organization launched.
  • Sponsors may also appreciate stories about the event’s impact on those you serve. But if you hear from a participant about how much they enjoyed your catered meal or how excited they were about winning a donated auction item, you could share those stories with the businesses that contributed those goods or services to pass along their gratitude.
  • Volunteers, in a similar vein to sponsors, might like to receive a combination of cause-related stories and quotes from participants or staff members about how particular volunteers helped them resolve issues during the event so they know you value their contributions of time.

Sending an initial thank-you followed by additional updates with more in-depth stories like this keeps your organization top of mind for all of these audiences. Then, the next time you’re looking for donors, sponsors, or volunteers for any initiative, you can reach back out to everyone who made your event possible, and they’ll be more likely to say yes!

As you incorporate storytelling into your nonprofit’s events in these different ways, track information like conversion rates for your marketing materials and post-event survey responses that mention stories. This way, you’ll have a reference for what storytelling strategies worked and which areas could be improved when you plan future events.

Learn more about how event planning software can help you incorporate your brand story into your event from start to finish by booking a time to talk to the EventUp Planner team.

Top Tips for Leveraging Branding Throughout Your Nonprofit Organization’s Event

  • Event Management
  • EventUp Planner Contributor
  • August 22, 2024
Group of people listening to a speaker in an auditorium.

Branding is a crucial part of any organization’s success. Effective branding helps supporters remember who you are, builds an identity for your nonprofit, and boosts your marketing and advertising results. Over time, you can communicate that identity with just a logo or mission statement— for example, think about the feelings, values, and ideologies that come to mind when you see the Nike logo or hear the brand’s slogan.

To strengthen your nonprofit’s brand identity, it’s important to weave your unique logo, mission statement, messaging, and other branded elements into everything you do, including your events. Events offer many opportunities to leverage the power of effective branding, from sharing invitations via direct mail to selling merchandise with your logo. 

In this guide, we’ll explore how you can use cohesive branding to your advantage during each stage of the fundraising process to drive event success. Let’s begin!

Phase 1: Planning

Planning your event is the most important part of the process. As Funds2Orgs’ guide to fundraising event planning highlights, this step will make or break your event’s ability to “drive revenue, expand your reach, and strengthen existing supporters’ connections to your organization.”

Keep your brand in mind during the following event-planning activities:

Defining the event’s purpose and goals.

Each of your fundraisers has some purpose or goal, such as raising money to pay for food and medical care for your animal shelter’s latest round of rescued puppies. Make sure there is a strong connection between your event’s purpose and your brand identity.

Creating event materials.

First, decide whether your nonprofit will use its standard branding or create a custom brand just for the event (like the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life). Then, plan how you’ll feature the branding on event materials like the event website, signage, tickets, packets, and more. For virtual or hybrid events, experiment with creative ways to incorporate your brand into the experience, such as designing a custom Zoom waiting room with branded graphics.

Developing a central theme or message.

Determine how you’ll communicate that connection to your supporters. Incorporate this message into all of your planning documents, especially your marketing plan. With features such as a drag-and-drop email builder and the ability to clone templates, EventUp Planner makes it simple to add your organization’s logo and branded copy to all of your event documents.

Keeping your brand in mind during the planning phase builds a strong foundation for the rest of the campaign. Shaping your event around your nonprofit’s identity and mission is much easier than trying to bend your brand around a mismatched fundraiser.

Phase 2: Promotion

During this phase, focus on spreading the word about your event to attract attendees. Reinforcing your branding in your marketing campaigns is crucial, particularly when you’re reaching out to donors through multiple communication channels (or balancing multiple events). Strong branding makes your communications more recognizable, trustworthy, and memorable. 

When your supporters can trust the email, social media post, or advertisement inviting them to your event, they’ll be more likely to attend. To establish this credibility and cultivate brand recognition, your organization should:

1. Develop a unified visual identity by incorporating your logo, brand colors, and fonts into each marketing message. This includes emails, flyers, posters, digital graphics, videos, and more. If the event has its own branding, make sure to add your nonprofit’s primary logo to these materials as well.

2. Try using brand storytelling, a technique that involves creating a narrative around your brand to build emotional connections with your supporters. For example, the clothing retailer Patagonia has an ongoing program called Worn Wear in which customers can trade in and buy used Patagonia items to offset clothing waste. This aligns with their branding as an environmentally-conscious, outdoor gear brand.

3. Always keep branding consistent across various communication channels. As Allegiance Group + Pursuant’s nonprofit digital marketing guide explains, this consistency is what will boost recognition the most among your supporters. Event planning tools like EventUp Planner can keep your event / fundraiser on-brand using handy features like an intuitive website builder, pre-built templates, and easy cloning functions.

Remember not to limit your focus on branding to just the visual elements. Your brand also extends to your messaging, which is influenced by your mission, values, promises to your beneficiaries and supporters, and other related concepts. In other words, your promotions shouldn’t just look like they belong to your nonprofit—they should also sound like your nonprofit.

Phase 3: Execution

Once it’s time for the event, you should have all of your event materials ready, finalize an agenda of activities for supporters, and expect plenty of attendees. To reinforce your branding at this stage, prioritize the following elements:

1. Environment: Ensure your event venue reflects your brand identity by using branded signage, banners, displays, and booths. Match your decor to both your brand and the event type (e.g., using tablecloths and floral arrangements at a gala and balloons and streamers at a charity race). To encourage more engagement, consider adding links or scannable QR codes to signage that lead attendees to your website, donation page, or social media accounts.

2. Experience: Offer a consistent experience that aligns with your values, from registration to the close of the event. For example, you might send attendees a heartfelt thank-you note when they register for the event, share a reminder email that tells the story of one of your beneficiaries, and have volunteers embody your brand values when interacting with supporters.

You can also enhance attendees’ experiences by offering interactive activities that immerse them in your brand. An organization dedicated to bringing clean water to those with limited access could set up an activity that allows attendees to walk through a day in the life of a beneficiary. Or, it might offer a mini volunteer opportunity such as assembling water filter kits to send to those in need.

Phase 4: Follow-up

Your work isn’t done when the event ends. Now, it’s time to dive into your event analytics and follow up with attendees.

Start by sharing personalized, branded thank-you messages with everyone who attended- sincerely thank them for their support, and leverage donor segmentation to tailor each message to their giving level and preferences. In addition to visual branding, clarify how their support and attendance at the event are promoting your brand values.

Consider reaching out to attendees for feedback as well. Share surveys that ask them about what went well and how you could improve. Add a question or two to gauge how well you communicated your brand, such as, “Are you aware of our core mission and values?” Event management software like EventUp Planner makes sending post-event communications and surveys an easy and painless process.

From planning your event to thanking attendees for their support, your branding should feature prominently during each step of the campaign. This gives each attendee a cohesive, positive experience with your nonprofit and frequently reminds them of who you are and what you stand for. As you refine your brand and infuse it into your marketing efforts, you’ll strengthen your nonprofit’s reputation as a trustworthy organization dedicated to social good.

Learn more about how EventUp Planner can help your nonprofit organization plan, manage, and track your events, without breaking your budget. Set up a free demo with our team today!