This week’s podcast features an enlightening conversation with Dr. JJ Peterson, head of StoryBrand and co-host of the Marketing Made Simple podcast. Dr. Peterson shares his expertise on how nonprofits can leverage the StoryBrand framework to clarify their messaging and engage donors more effectively. With a background in both the nonprofit and for-profit sectors, he offers unique insights into the differences and similarities in their marketing strategies.
Key Topics:
- The StoryBrand framework and its application to nonprofit marketing.
- The importance of viewing donors as customers.
- Strategies for creating compelling narratives that engage donors and drive action.
- The significance of clear, concise messaging in reducing donor fatigue and increasing engagement.
- Effective email marketing and donor follow-up strategies.
Critical Insights and Quotes:
- StoryBrand Framework: Dr. Peterson outlines the seven elements of a compelling story: character, problem, guide, plan, call to action, success, and failure. “Nonprofits need to position their donors as the heroes of the story,” he emphasizes.
- Donor Engagement: “When people get to be a part of transformational work, their lives are better because of it,” says Dr. Peterson, highlighting the importance of inviting donors into the narrative.
- Email Marketing: Dr. Peterson advises nonprofits to use nurture emails to stay connected with donors throughout the year, providing value without always asking for donations. “You want to be there, top of mind, when they are ready to give,” he explains.
- Overcoming Objections: Addressing potential donor objections head-on can build trust and transparency. “Acknowledge the objection and then explain how you address it,” he suggests.
Calls to Action:
- For Nonprofits: Visit mystorybrand.com to create a brand script that will help clarify your nonprofit’s messaging.
- For Listeners: Subscribe to the Marketing Made Simple podcast for more valuable insights on marketing strategies.
Closing Thought:
Dr. Peterson’s insights remind us that effective storytelling is not about making the nonprofit the hero but about empowering donors and stakeholders to see themselves as vital participants in the mission. By simplifying and clarifying their message, nonprofits can better engage their audience and inspire action.
Transcript
[00:00:00]
[00:00:00] George: This week on the podcast, I’ve chased down an amazing guest because I’m a fan of their work. His name is Dr. JJ Peterson, among many things. He is head of StoryBrand leading, leading the company’s [00:00:14] efforts in helping businesses clarify their messaging. He’s a host of Marketing Made Simple, the Marketing Made Simple podcast, sharing valuable insights on marketing strategies. Also an adjunct professor at the Owen school of business at [00:00:28] Vanderbilt contributing to the education of future business leaders. And I have, I’ve chased him down because I want to talk about where his work overlaps with nonprofit strategy. How’s it going? Dr. JJ Peterson.
[00:00:40] Dr. JJ Peterson: It’s going great. Thanks for [00:00:42] having me excited to be here.
[00:00:44] George: Well, you were saying before we hit the record button, which is always where the most valuable things happen, that you spent time in the nonprofit sector, cutting your teeth on the most difficult job in the world. Then you went over to the easy [00:00:56] side, which is, Hey, I have a widget to sell you. Can you help explain the biggest differences you see between the type of work done in nonprofit versus for profit sectors as it relates to that brand story?[00:01:10]
[00:01:10] Dr. JJ Peterson: The business, the biggest difference I see between nonprofits and for profit is actually that nonprofits don’t see themselves as a business. And I think that they they struggle in a lot of ways when it [00:01:24] comes to fundraising, getting donations, volunteers, because they don’t actually think of their donors as customers.
[00:01:32] And that, I think, you know, I get it. I, I come from the nonprofit world. I mean, [00:01:38] literally like my, my junior year in college, I was planning on becoming a teacher and I went and spent the summer in Mexico, helping an organization build homes. And I came back from that and said, I want to do this. I want [00:01:52] to help you.
[00:01:52] And they said, we need somebody to do marketing and public relations. And so I said, okay, I’ll change my major, my junior year in college to marketing public relations. And then went to immediately when I graduated college, right into helping this [00:02:06] huge organization, they didn’t have any marketing and public relations.
[00:02:10] And so I get it that when you’re in that world, that Really, like, you’re driven by mission and you’re driven by cause, and it feels [00:02:20] weird to think of your donors as customers. But the reality is, I think that if nonprofits actually started thinking a little bit more like businesses and thought of their donors as customers that of somebody they had to [00:02:34] invite into a story, invite into participating in the nonprofit organization’s work in order to change themselves and change the world.
[00:02:43] I think they would be better off because of it.
[00:02:47] George: I feel [00:02:48] that is a great point to jump off from and maybe go into the story brand framework born from, I believe, Donald Miller’s work on the story brand. Also a book I know. Additions keep coming out pretty amazing, but can you [00:03:02] walk us through what that story brand framework is?
[00:03:05] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah. So the framework really is designed to use story theory and really in many ways, screenwriting principles to create clear, uh, Marketing that engages [00:03:16] customers and and I’ll interchange, you know, be as I say, customers on here, because I already kind of clarified that. I think nonprofits need to think of their donors as customers.
[00:03:24] When I say donor, when I say customers, I also mean donors and [00:03:30] so what the story brand framework does is teach people how to. Invite customers and donors into a story. Most companies they think, or most nonprofits think our job is to tell our [00:03:44] story well. And I don’t blame them for that, but because that’s kind of common thinking, right?
[00:03:49] We have to tell our story. Well, the reality is that you’re, when you’re doing that, you’re actually telling the wrong story. What [00:03:58] you’re, what you want to be doing is positioning your customer or your donor as the hero of the story. And so when we do that, what that is doing is it’s actually inviting our customers and donors into a story where they get to [00:04:12] be the hero of and get to change the world.
[00:04:14] And, and so what we’ve done a story brand is we’ve really taken all these story principles and narrowed it down to really 7 elements that are in any good story that you tell. So, if you see a [00:04:26] movie, you read a book, or any compelling story that moves people to action has to have these seven elements. And to kind of cover them at a very high level, the first is that there needs to be a character who wants something.
[00:04:38] In a movie, [00:04:40] you’ll discover within the first nine minutes that you’ll be able to clearly say this main character, the hero of the story, they want this. You’ll be able to say that in a good movie. Then, the story gets good when the hero encounters a problem. [00:04:54] That really lights the fire of the story and makes it interesting.
[00:04:58] Then the hero can’t solve the problem on their own, so they meet a guide. That’s somebody who comes along and helps them win the day. That’s Yoda. That’s [00:05:08] Obi Wan Kenobi. That’s Gandalf. It’s somebody who is older, wiser, that comes along and helps the hero win. Then step four in a story is the guide gives the hero a plan.
[00:05:20] You always hear the phrase like, what’s the [00:05:22] plan or here’s the plan in a movie, which is basically just showing the audience. There’s a simple way forward for the hero to win that the guide gives the hero. Then there’s a moment that the hero has to be called to action. [00:05:36] So maybe a bomb is going to go off.
[00:05:38] Like there’s a countdown clock that the hero has to act in order to save the day where everything is destroyed. And then the final two pieces is that there are stakes in the story. So we have either. [00:05:50] Positive stakes, which we call success or negative stakes, which we call failure. Meaning that something has to be foreshadowed that is going to be won or lost by the hero.
[00:06:01] So the hero, like if in the beginning of the movie, they [00:06:04] wanna get the girl, the success at the end of the movie is they get the girl and they get married and they live happily ever after Failure. That’s foreshadowed is that they, maybe the girl who they’re trying to get was kidnapped and she could die.[00:06:18]
[00:06:18] And so we know that both of those things can happen in the story. Those have both been foreshadows and that kind of creates the whole, the end of the story. So those are the seven elements of story. A character who wants something, who [00:06:32] encounters a problem, who meets a guide that gives them a plan, That calls them to action that results in either success or failure.
[00:06:40] So that’s any movie, any story, and you’ll, you’ll see that literally that’s every movie you’ve seen. [00:06:46] Practically what we do is we would then take those same principles and apply it to nonprofits and for profit companies. What we help people establish is talking points that create a clear [00:07:00] marketing story.
[00:07:01] And so what you’re looking at is the same principles is what does your hero, what is your customer, your donor? What do they want? What problem are they facing? Encountering how do we, as [00:07:14] an organization come alongside them and become their guide with some empathy and some authority to show that we know what we’re doing.
[00:07:21] What is our plan for them? What is their call to action? And what is success and [00:07:28] failure look like? If they do or don’t act and we help companies really create talking points in each of those buckets. So that. Their marketing message can actually be really clear, compelling, and really move people to [00:07:42] action.
[00:07:42] George: I feel like, at the high level, I get it. I’ve watched all of the Star Wars and spin off trilogy, series, like, all of it. I’m, you know, this is the way. I’m here for it. Now, my question is, [00:07:56] I’m a non profit listening to this, and I’m like, okay, but I’m not writing. The script to the next epic interstellar novella, like not what I’m doing. I’m writing this story and maybe this works for my annual appeal, my [00:08:10] statement. How do I tease this out over time as you break this down? Like I write this once I’ve got a massive script. How do I tease this out in my communication strategy over the next six months?[00:08:24]
[00:08:24] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah. Well, let me back up just a little bit. So one of the questions you asked earlier was what’s the difference between for profit and non profit when it comes to just the way they look at things, but also the way they do marketing. When it [00:08:38] comes to for profit, they’ve got a product or service that they’re selling.
[00:08:41] And so it’s actually really easy. It’s really kind of step by step what I just talked about. For non profits, there really are two different ways to tell the story. Yeah. Absolutely. The [00:08:52] first is to position your donor as the hero of the story, which sounds weird because we, you know, we know the people we serve are really our heroes, but in a marketing sense, you have to identify what it is that your hero wants.
[00:09:05] What [00:09:06] is your donor want? They want to make a difference in the world. But the problem is, let’s say you’re doing water wells in Africa that you’re, you’re, you’re. Hero, your donor concern is concerned about clean drinking water and wants to make a difference. The [00:09:20] problem is they can’t go to Africa and they don’t have the expertise to go.
[00:09:24] Then we come along as a guide and say, we get it. We’ve we live in Africa. We work there and we’ve actually helped 5000 villages get access to clean water. [00:09:34] Then you give them a plan. Here’s how we, here’s how we do it. Or here’s how you can be involved. You, you know, choose a country. Choose a project and donate monthly.
[00:09:44] And then we give a call to action that says donate [00:09:48] monthly, and then we give success and failure. When you give, you’re able to make a difference. If you don’t, then people are still in need of water. That’s really telling. And so you would write those positions out, those talking points for that donor story.[00:10:02]
[00:10:02] So let’s say you’re launching something for mother’s day and mother’s day campaign, you do the same thing. What is the donor? What for mother’s day? They want their gift to matter. The problem is perfume is just not going to cut it, you know? And so you kind of walk through the whole thing so you can [00:10:16] do that.
[00:10:16] The other way of really thinking about how to tell a nonprofit story is the traditional way, which is to position the people you serve as the hero of the story. So, you identify, [00:10:30] if I go back to water wells in Africa, you identify that the hero of the story is the single mom who wants clean water for her family.
[00:10:39] The problem is, she has to walk five miles every day to [00:10:44] get that water. We understand this because we’ve lived there with her, and this is how we’ve helped build her life. 500 moms just like here. Here’s our plan for her. One, we get, we bring water to her village. Two, we do education and three, we do [00:10:58] ongoing support.
[00:10:59] So, and then here’s where the, the one thing changes in this version is you say, so give, so the call to action doesn’t go to your, the hero, the recipient of your work, the call to action goes to the donor. [00:11:12] And then you, Say, and when you give, then she has success and avoids failure. So the first step really is to just sit down and identify those seven talking [00:11:26] points of your story.
[00:11:27] How does this work? How do we say this very clearly? Then what you do is you take those talking points and you tease them out in different pieces of collateral. So on your website, [00:11:40] at the very top of your website, you want to talk about. Clean water in Africa, because that’s what the hero wants. Then the next section, you want to talk about the problems that people are experiencing.
[00:11:50] Then you want to bring in some testimonies to position yourself as a [00:11:54] guide, to show that you know what you’re doing. Then you want to give your three step plan to show how it works in Africa, how the water wells work. And you’re just taking those pieces that you created in your brand script and you’re putting them on [00:12:08] websites in different areas, or you’re turning them into One section into a video for social media, or you’re turning a testimony or story into an email that you use pieces of it, but all of it, what the, what the brand script [00:12:22] does is really make sure that you’re repeating a clear and concise message that is, that is repeated over and over and over again.
[00:12:30] So people actually understand what you do.[00:12:36]
[00:12:45] George: Insert hero here from moment a, which is a [00:12:50] downstate to moment B, which is an upstate.
[00:12:53] Dr. JJ Peterson: Absolutely.
[00:12:54] George: I think that package is important because oftentimes I think maybe we think of the hero as our staff or we, we are our own heroes. I am the gentle little center of [00:13:04] the universe in my mind.
[00:13:07] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah. Exactly.
[00:13:09] George: and pulling away from that, it’s helpful because I’m not writing the entire script.
[00:13:12] I’m applying this framework, but it seems like you’re referencing something else. This sort of, [00:13:18] What I would consider like a, a seed prompt a core essence, but I think you call it a brand script that you’re, you’re sampling from. And that seems like it is an overarching narrative, a guidepost for [00:13:32] then these tiny little spinoff stories.
[00:13:34] My like, Mandalorian as a spinoff of a character from the main,
[00:13:42] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah. You, what, what you do really is you create these [00:13:46] talking points, these, these brand scripts for any campaign that you’re doing, any project you’re doing, any kind of emergency, and they’re going to look different in different contexts. Right? So [00:14:00] one of the things that I talked to a lot of nonprofits about is I would say that there’s really.
[00:14:05] Four different types of nonprofit work that I think most nonprofits can fall into four categories. There is [00:14:14] relief, development, empowerment, and justice. So those kind of, to me, most nonprofits fit in one of those four relief, development, empowerment, and justice. If I’m creating a brand story [00:14:28] for any nonprofit that works in any of those areas, it works the same way that I just went through.
[00:14:34] You’re really actually creating same thing. Who’s the hero? What’s the problem? How are we the guide? What’s our plan? What’s the call to action? What does [00:14:42] success and failure look like? Here’s where then it changes how it looks in practicality. If you are in relief, So you are coming in after a flood, or there is [00:14:56] a severe outbreak of something, or, you know, and shots can help, or, you know, there’s kids that are vulnerable this minute.
[00:15:05] In that, you actually need to highlight the problem [00:15:10] language and the failure language a lot more. In your marketing, because people need to wake up to the problem that’s happening right now. The research shows though, that once you move into development and empowerment, [00:15:24] so it’s long term work, you actually have to lower the language that you use around problem and failure.
[00:15:32] And up the language around success. So you actually have to cast a brighter vision [00:15:38] for smiley, happy people who have moved forward and are conquering things. Then if you work in the justice area, you actually kind of go a little bit back and forth. So if you’re working in justice and there is [00:15:52] something immediately that needs to be brought, say before Congress, and we need people to call right now to call their Senator to make a difference, then.
[00:16:01] We, we have to actually up the failure and the up the problem in the language [00:16:06] that we use. But if it’s environmental causes that really are like something that is a long term effect, it’s ongoing work. We can’t immediately go to that failure and problem in a very hard way because people will [00:16:20] start to get.
[00:16:22] So we need to cast a vision of success, a lot more success, and a lot more walking through the plan of how to win the day. So it doesn’t matter what work you’re in, you [00:16:34] create those talking points, your foundational story, but then how you use those is very different depending on what type of work you’re doing.
[00:16:42] Some you may emphasize the problem and the failure a little bit more, and some you may emphasize [00:16:48] the plan and success a little bit more. But. All the pieces need to be there throughout your marketing in different places.
[00:16:54] George: Awesome. I want to, to recap these seven elements, the character, which is either the customer or our stakeholder [00:17:02] with a problem meets a guide, which is your nonprofit gives them a plan. You were creating the plan, a call to action. Results in success or failure. And then we’re putting our thumb on the [00:17:16] various points of the story along the way, creating a brand script for each of those little spinoff campaigns
[00:17:21] that we’re doing.
[00:17:23] Dr. JJ Peterson: Exactly. And this is incredibly important. And this goes back to, so my dissertation really is a narrative theory. [00:17:30] And what you do when you create this, when you create this brand script that really has this kind of cohesive narrative to it by using this framework, what you’re doing is creating what research calls narrative [00:17:44] transportation.
[00:17:45] So, when you have a story that actually is simple for people to understand, clear that people could understand and has these, all these elements in it, you create a good quality narrative. [00:17:58] What the research shows is that the better the narrative, the more clear, the more simple, the more people can buy into it, the more narrative transportation they experience.
[00:18:08] Narrative transportation is when we kind of put ourselves in the [00:18:12] story. Like if you’re in a movie and you jump when something’s scary or you laugh when something’s funny, we’ve, you’ve experienced narrative transportation. You kind of like forget about your environment and you’re like in the story. Well, that can happen in marketing [00:18:26] too, and what the research shows is the better the story, the higher level of narrative transportation.
[00:18:30] The research goes further to say that the higher level of narrative transportation that people experience, the more influence that story has over their thoughts. [00:18:40] Thoughts and their actions, it’s actually shown to decrease counter arguments in people’s head and ultimately up persuasive power of the story.
[00:18:51] So it really like if you [00:18:54] want to move people to action, if you want to change their mind and move them to action, the research shows story is the most powerful way to do that. The way that you make sure that your story is actually going to be effective is by making sure it [00:19:08] has what It’s called fidelity and coherency, meaning it makes sense and it actually all sticks together.
[00:19:14] It’s real. And the StoryBrand framework kind of forces you by hitting on these talking points to make sure that your story [00:19:22] has all of it. Because if, for instance, a non profit is trying to explain what they do, but they get very vague in that very first one. Like, so the very first thing is what does the character want?
[00:19:35] That’s what we’re [00:19:36] answering the question. What is your customer? Was your donor one? Well, if they want to just change the world, like if that’s what a nonprofit is saying, that’s very vague. That doesn’t actually enter us into a story. We have to get really [00:19:50] specific with that. What does the character actually want?
[00:19:53] They want to end. Human trafficking across the world. Okay. Now we’ve gotten specific versus just kind of change the world or make a difference. We [00:20:04] got to get really specific. And then if the problem that we’re addressing is not specific, or we bring in too many problems, we talk about how we solve this and this and this and this and this, we’ve broken the rules of story.
[00:20:17] [00:20:18] So what the story brand framework does is force you to kind of live within the constraints of. A story narrative, which forces your story to actually be more effective and actually move people to act.[00:20:32]
[00:20:32] George: An underlying thread I’m seeing here. Overlay is with I think one of the biggest challenges nonprofits face, which is that they are by design attacking intractable problems, things that are [00:20:46] so large and so hard to get our heads around, which is why we have, you know, this social good force working on it. We have this combination of intractable problem. Plus, you mentioned fatigue. [00:21:00] Fatigue. And especially in election cycles and times of turmoil, that fatigue, the base level, right? You were, you were mentioning before you even came to this. I mean, your energy is amazing. You just came from a pretty intense meeting. [00:21:14] Your donors are coming from this intense meeting mindset as well. They’re bogged down and your approach seems to move us from confusion to clarity. This confusion to clarity seems to be a key because we’re attracted to one [00:21:28] over the other. And I don’t know if you can tease that out a bit more.
[00:21:32] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah, so when we, when we think about our lives, like you just brought up an amazing thing, because there’s all these different studies. One [00:21:42] shows that we, as the average human, receives between 3 and 5, 000 commercial messages a day. So we are being
[00:21:49] George: This message brought to you by you right now are
[00:21:54] receiving content marketing. [00:21:56]
[00:21:56] Dr. JJ Peterson: 001, right there, right? So we, we’re receiving so much information and that’s just advertising. That’s not like, you know, having to go and pick up kids from school. And what’s for dinner tonight and all the other stuff that’s in our brain. So [00:22:10] our brain actually has a limited, I mean, we talk about limited attention span, but one of the things that actually is going on in your brain.
[00:22:18] Is it any given moment your brain has a limited number of calories to, [00:22:24] to give towards thinking and processing information. So this, your, your brain is burning calories all day long. It’s actually burning more calories than pretty much any other organ in the body and at any given time, there’s kind of [00:22:38] a limited number and the more you have to think and process information, the lower that number You know, that threshold goes, but your brain also knows that there could be an emergency at any minute [00:22:52] and we need to still have calories left.
[00:22:54] To deal with an emergency if it comes up so what our brain is doing is it scanning our environment at any given moment of those 3000 messages that are coming in anything that like, [00:23:06] you know, I’m looking at your screen right now. I see you have bricks behind you that the number of bricks behind you is actually available to me, but my brain ignores it.
[00:23:16] Because I don’t need to know that information to survive. So it [00:23:20] gets rid of that information, literally kind of like tunes out any information that doesn’t directly contribute to our survival and thriving. And it kind of tunes out information that is complicated and makes us think too much. So [00:23:34] when it comes to nonprofit stories, so often we have these like beautiful, but sometimes long stories.
[00:23:44] Of change that we’ve been a part of, let me tell you about [00:23:48] Griselda when she was five years old, she grew up and, you know, and then we tell this whole beautiful transformation that,
[00:23:55] George: the
[00:23:57] Dr. JJ Peterson: in a, in the right context is beautiful and done well, and it’s going to [00:24:02] make people cry and move them to action. The reality is most people don’t have time to sit through a 15 minute story and their brain is going the whole time.
[00:24:12] How does this contribute to my survival and thriving? How does this [00:24:16] contribute to my survival and thriving? So when we tell that one beautiful story of transformation, or those two beautiful stories of transformation, those are wonderful, but people don’t have time for that most of the time. [00:24:30] So what we, when I, when we talk about clarity and getting rid of the confusion, what we’re really talking about is helping people understand quickly what it is that we do.
[00:24:40] And how they can be a part of it in a way that [00:24:44] they don’t have to burn any calories to understand. Cause a lot of times, you know, like if you walk up to a nonprofit person who works for a nonprofit and you go, so, so what do you do? They go, oh, well, it’s kind of complicated.
[00:24:55] George: This[00:24:58]
[00:24:58] Dr. JJ Peterson: What you’re telling me is this is going to be, I’m going to have to burn too many calories to understand, and I’m already, I’ve already tuned you out. I’m already moving on. That’s a very harsh way. And you know, most people are more kind than that, but that’s the reality of what most people are [00:25:12] dealing with.
[00:25:13] Nonprofits really need to be. concise and tight with their message, especially on what I would call first date opportunities. So if you’re at a booth at a conference or [00:25:26] you’ve been invited to a school or a church to talk about what you do, or you have a website, any of those spots that are really first date opportunities It needs to be incredibly concise [00:25:40] and tight.
[00:25:41] What is it that you do? What is the problem you fix? How have you fixed this? What is your plan to fix it? What do people need to do to get involved in what is life like if they do or don’t? Those talking [00:25:54] points should guide everything you’re talking about on first date kind of initial conversations.
[00:25:59] George: of this? There is What is the future of this? A stat that I think really haunts a lot of [00:26:08] fundraising experts out there, and it is that for every survey I have seen, it is essentially breaks down to after someone gives you money for the first time, that first date after that first date, [00:26:22] only one in five, only one in five donors are coming back the subsequent year. And you can plus or minus it. I’m curious your take on this.
[00:26:34] Dr. JJ Peterson: I think there’s a couple of [00:26:36] reasons. One, I think a lot of nonprofits are not following up. So I think that’s, I mean, just genuinely like the, a lot of nonprofits I work with, I will hear them talk about getting donations and then literally say, so what emails are you sending out? What are [00:26:50] you following up with?
[00:26:50] They’re like, we don’t think we’ll fix that. Fit. Let’s fix that. The second thing is, is that they’re only reaching out when they’re asking for money. What you really should be doing is once you identify, [00:27:04] say, so let’s say we go back to this water wells in Africa situation here, somebody has given, because they want to make a difference.
[00:27:12] In the world, when it comes to providing clean water in that context, in that [00:27:18] story, what are other things that we can give a value that asks nothing of them that furthers their story. So they want to be an advocate. They want to be a champion. They want to be an expert when it comes to [00:27:32] clean water. So can we send a monthly email?
[00:27:36] That’s not a newsletter to please don’t call it a newsletter, call it something that furthers their story. So, you know, call it like the, [00:27:46] the monthly advocate letter. I mean, just like something like about your hero, about your customer, about your donor, not about the company that gives them value. So what are some statistics you can give them that continue to inform them?
[00:27:58] What is a [00:28:00] special screening of a movie that’s coming out that they might want to be a part of? What are some things that they can use to talk to their friends about raising money for water in Africa? Can we send them something from the people in [00:28:14] Africa that just says a thank you? We want to do what we call nurture emails.
[00:28:19] So what I call nurture emails is basically staying connected with your donor or stakeholder Guys. Bye. throughout the year and [00:28:28] asking nothing of them. You’re just nurturing the relationship. These are short emails. These are quick emails, but they are filled with value. It’s something, a story that they want to hear access to information they don’t [00:28:42] have or tips to be able to kind of further things along in their journey.
[00:28:46] That’s it. Now at the bottom, you can have a donate. button. That’s fine. But these are not sales campaign emails. It’s just every [00:28:56] week you’re staying connected with your donors. And if that’s, if every week’s too much once a month, you, but no big asks in this,
[00:29:04] George: to go.
[00:29:05] Dr. JJ Peterson: find those moments to get the big asks. Like seasonally, you know, [00:29:10] it comes towards the end of the year.
[00:29:11] If, if you’re back to school kind of fits in the calendar or winter fits because you work in a homeless shelter, find those seasonal moments to send out real actual kind of like [00:29:24] solicitation donor emails, trying to get people to donate, but the rest of the year, you should just be sending something of value to them, stay connected and nurture that relationship.
[00:29:36] George: think the, the [00:29:38] comment that, I The don’t call it a newsletter should hit you like a ton of bricks. Newsletter news, North, East, West, South news, things that are important to the organization, [00:29:52] not to you, you literally set yourself up for failure at the initial outset by calling it and treating it like a newsletter versus a nurture letter. I, I think, you know, worth, [00:30:06] bears worth repeating,
[00:30:07] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah.
[00:30:08] George: your newsletter, stop it.
[00:30:09] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah, and, and a lot of nonprofits go, well, the way we get most of our emails is through our newsletter. Our newsletter is really successful. And I don’t doubt that. I actually don’t doubt that. And in, for many of [00:30:20] nonprofits that I work with, I go, don’t change the content, change the title, and maybe change a little bit of the content, but change the title.
[00:30:29] George: put me in.
[00:30:29] Dr. JJ Peterson: It depends on the, depends on the organization. But, you know, change the title [00:30:34] and you’re going to get more emails. That’s the whole point is that you really want to build your email base. And if you’re using social media, if you’re using any other tools out there, if you’re going and giving a talk, [00:30:48] if you’re standing up in front of an audience, which And, and I mean that digitally or in person.
[00:30:52] So you’re giving a keynote talk, giving a workshop at a conference, or you’re just online doing a reel. You want to figure out how to [00:31:02] get people off of those spaces and onto your email list. So if you’re talking at a, at a conference, your call to action at the end of that conference, very honestly should probably not be [00:31:16] donate.
[00:31:16] It probably shouldn’t be donate. It should be, I’m going to give you something for free in exchange for an email address. So I’m going to give you like this, or if you want these slides, or if you want these statistics, or if you’d like to be engaged in this, [00:31:30] put your email address here. Don’t do, don’t say go to our website and donate.
[00:31:34] You want to be able to follow up with those emails. A recent study by HubSpot showed that [00:31:44] email has the highest rate of return on investment compared to any other marketing strategy. The average, the average, not if you’re good. But the average return on dollar spent [00:31:58] is for every dollar you invest, you get 42 back.
[00:32:01] So that is a 4, 200 percent return on investment. That is 3, 600 percent higher than the next area of spent. Like when you’re talking about [00:32:12] paid ads or anything else. Email still works. 92 percent of Americans check their email every single day.
[00:32:20] George: organizations and
[00:32:21] Dr. JJ Peterson: And oddly enough, the younger generations are using email [00:32:26] more than the older generations right now.
[00:32:28] Even it’s kind of insane, especially when it comes to being involved in organizations and purchasing things. The older generation still uses it for connection, but the younger generation uses it for [00:32:40] information tribal. Connection as in working for a nonprofit, working with a community and then purchasing.
[00:32:48] So it still works. And you really want to get people off of those [00:32:54] places, wherever you’re speaking in person or social media to a website where they give you their email address for whatever it is. And I would just say, don’t call it a newsletter, monthly tips, monthly advocacy report, [00:33:08] monthly something that they get on a regular basis that helps them not talks about you.
[00:33:14] You can talk about you, but it has to be framed in that. It’s helping them become who they want to be. And you’re going to see a much higher return on that.
[00:33:21] George: You [00:33:22] really do also practice what you preach. I have listened you know, to, to your podcast and you address your audience as heroes, you’re like every single time and multiple times you’re like, Hey heroes, how are you doing? Like, and. [00:33:36] Honestly, I’m taking, I’m like, taking that note right now. I have been messing this up for decades and I think it’s important to acknowledge the people in the room.
[00:33:45] Think about the humans that have self selected to listen to [00:33:50] information about justice, reform, relief, development. Like, those are awesome people, dare I say, heroes. I’m So thank you for that. I mean, this is, you know, this podcast is actually just for [00:34:04] me, so the listeners are here, but this is just, you know, me getting to ask whatever I want. There is a cardinal sin that I think many many commit after acquiring an email and I call it, [00:34:18] I’m workshopping it, the Jersey turnpike problem.
[00:34:21] Dr. JJ Peterson: Go on.
[00:34:22] George: you pull onto the Jersey Turnpike and you got to get going. You got to get zero to 60 in a hurry because there’s no onboarding. There’s no welcome to our community.
[00:34:31] [00:34:32] Here are the words we use. Here’s what we are doing. You’re just flying down the road. At, you know, a generous 15, but not more than that over the speed limit. Cause you don’t want to get, you know, get caught there. Can you talk to me about [00:34:46] your perfect approach to welcome series using the story brand approach?
[00:34:52] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yeah. So the, the first thing you do is if somebody offers you their email address, if you’re lucky enough to get an email address is [00:35:00] just thank them. That’s it. And then do a very quick explanation of what you offer. Do not ask, do not put a hard ask there at all. Use the next couple emails to move into an ask, but that first email is just, Hey, thanks [00:35:14] for signing up for our newsletter.
[00:35:15] Thanks for downloading this video or thanks for whatever, or thanks for your donation. And then here’s the quick way that I would introduce your
[00:35:25] George: education and programming
[00:35:27] Dr. JJ Peterson: [00:35:28] First, write one sentence about the problem that your organization solves.
[00:35:33] George: we
[00:35:34] Dr. JJ Peterson: Then write a second sentence that talks about how you solve it. And then the third sentence is what is [00:35:42] life like when that problem is solved.
[00:35:45] So if you are, if you do, let’s, let’s do water wells in Africa. You can say, you know, I’m going to make up the statistics. I don’t know what I’ll say. You know, [00:35:56] there are, you know, in sub Sahara Africa, there are. 10 million people that don’t have access to clean water, but at blank [00:36:10] organization, we bring clean water to villages through education and construction so that people not only have access to clean water, but can live long and fruitful lives.
[00:36:23] So [00:36:24] problem, 10 million people don’t have access to clean water. Third, second, we bring clean water through education and construction. Third, so people not only get clean water, but they actually live fruitful lives. [00:36:38] And that’s it. Problem, solution, results. Don’t do anything else you can say you can do in the bottom, like in the footer, maybe a donate now kind of thing, but just thank ’em for being a part of it and then tell a short version of [00:36:52] that longer story I told earlier, problem, solution, success.
[00:36:55] That’s it. Then when you start going into the next few emails that are coming out, the way I would start is. Problem solution [00:37:06] emails. So the next couple of emails I would send is here is a problem that’s going on in the world, in our area. Here’s how we actually fix that and you can, how you can be a part of it.
[00:37:15] Now I wouldn’t even say this is not how we fix it. I would say, this is how you can be a part of fixing it [00:37:20] and name then another problem. That you, that is in that space. Problem solution. Don’t try to name five different problems in one email. Just do problem solution, problem solution, problem solution.
[00:37:32] Then you can throw in a [00:37:34] testimony and give a testimony that actually goes through the full story that I mentioned earlier. This person wanted this, they encountered this problem. Here’s how we helped them. Here’s how their life is like now. Give a testimony. Then after that, you [00:37:48] can really start, well, the next thing I would say is if there are any objections.
[00:37:52] That you think your donors have to giving to you address those objections. So if it’s like, well, we’re not sure that all the money [00:38:02] actually goes to the projects. Then write an email, acknowledging that objection. Look, we get that giving to a nonprofit can sometimes feel a little scary because you don’t know where the money goes.
[00:38:12] Let me tell you how we’re transparent. So name the objection, [00:38:16] overcome the objection. Then. So really when I’m creating campaigns of like, let’s get somebody to donate right now, it is thank you email. Then I send two to three problem solution emails, then a [00:38:30] testimony email. Then I hit on any big major objections, one or two objections.
[00:38:35] I might throw in another testimony, or then I might just then try to close the deal after that. The final email is really like a more like, Hey, [00:38:44] give the problem we’re experiencing is this. Here’s how we’re going to fix it. This is your opportunity to make a difference give now, and that’s, that’s the campaign and you can.
[00:38:55] And then, so when somebody gives you their email [00:38:58] address, typically, I kind of just put them in for nonprofits. I just put them in the monthly newsletter. I put them in the monthly nurture campaign that’s happening. Then, when it comes to that seasonal time of giving, I’m entering them into a 5 to [00:39:12] 6 email campaign that is then asking for those donations and really moving into that space.
[00:39:20] George: there’s also an element of delivering value, you’re helping inform them
[00:39:24] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yes.
[00:39:25] George: from an [00:39:26] expert’s opinion. Remember, you are the guide and there’s real value because this is a person, remember a hero who has opted into learning more. Let us help you on your journey to learn more. And then do more to change this issue.
[00:39:39] So it [00:39:40] definitely maps. I like the overcoming objections, like that little. Throw in there is incredibly, uh, I’d say overlooked, but important to call out the elephant in the room. Whatever your elephant may be, even if it is in fact, an elephant, [00:39:54] we have a client who works to save elephants. So I
[00:39:56] Dr. JJ Peterson: Yes, exactly.
[00:39:57] George: guess the metaphors get a little messy. But yes, the overcoming objections is important. I’m curious how how long a time are we saying like, Hey, this welcome series takes 10 years. [00:40:08] Probably not. Does it take 10 minutes? Nope.
[00:40:10] Dr. JJ Peterson: It, it, it kind of, so the shorter amount of money you’re asking for, smaller amount of, sorry, the smaller amount of money you’re asking for, the shorter And more [00:40:22] compressed, the sequence should be, this is not a, there’s, this number is not magical, but if you’re really trying to get people to give like a hundred dollars or under, then I would probably do like two weeks, five emails, five or six [00:40:36] emails.
[00:40:36] And they’re really, I’ve looked up, I’ve read every article you can think of on like, what is the statistics of, Of how often you should send and how many you should send. And there isn’t any. So if anybody tells you there’s a [00:40:50] magic number, there isn’t. But I tend to, the rules I tend to think of is like the, the smaller, the donation.
[00:40:58] Or in, in customer terms, the smaller price point, the, the [00:41:04] more compressed the, the sequence needs to be and the shorter it needs to be. So two weeks, five emails. If you’re going for a huge. Donation, you’re going for legacy kind of gifts and [00:41:18] things like that, then you actually do need to do a little bit more of exactly what you talked about, deliver way more value, stay, build a relationship for longer.
[00:41:27] So you might be doing a 6 month campaign that’s telling more [00:41:32] testimonies, that’s giving more kind of information and value through that season. And it might be. It might still be only, you know, 12 emails over six months, but the higher the donation, the [00:41:46] longer you spend, the longer you spread that out and the more value you have to give.
[00:41:51] George: You mentioned on the Marketing Made Simple podcast a number of times when giving advice that there is tremendous value and importance to being top of [00:42:00] mind for the customer when they are in a state of need. I think it is tough when you are, you know, a nonprofit working for a cause greater than yourself every day.
[00:42:12] How could you not care? You [00:42:14] being the audience, how could you not be caring about this all of the time? I can’t imagine it. And. That is the urgency behind why you’re saying like weekly, I mean, at least monthly, but please don’t go [00:42:28] dark and then expect people to have you top of mind. Can you apply that top of mind thinking and why that value is so important for nonprofits?
[00:42:39] Dr. JJ Peterson: I bet if, if we, every [00:42:42] listener right now, if they’re on here, if we were all in a room together and I said, how many of you check your email every day, statistically more than 90 percent would raise their hand, nine out of 10 would raise their hand. Then if I said, How [00:42:56] many of you get emails that you don’t read, but you don’t unsubscribe from those lists?
[00:43:01] The same percentage of people are going to raise their hand. So just like if we really think of ourselves, we as [00:43:10] consumers don’t, we get a ton of email in our inbox. We don’t unsubscribe for a lot of them. And we also don’t read a lot of them. I mean, if, if you’re, if anybody has anything like me, but they’re there and they’re constantly kind of coming across [00:43:24] my, my desktop or my phone.
[00:43:27] And I’m thinking about those things. Even if I just see their name, I’m like, if you know, I see it on a regular basis. Those are the people I’m going to turn to in that moment. [00:43:38] So even I donate, I think right now I do monthly donations to, I believe four different nonprofits. I’m on the board of two of them.
[00:43:46] And so I. donate to four different nonprofits. I’m on the board of two and I don’t read [00:43:52] them, but I don’t unsubscribe them. They’re there. And it’s kind of a constant reminder for me. And then the, the truth is, is that for other people who aren’t even as involved as I am with some of these is when Christmas [00:44:06] comes around, you want, who they want, you want them to have seen your email six times.
[00:44:11] That year, minimally, you know, even if they missed a couple or when it comes to Thanksgiving end of year donating, you don’t want to just show up then you want to [00:44:20] have been consistent with them so that by the time end of your donations come, they’re going, Oh, that’s right. That’s right. I’ve been thinking about them for the past six months.
[00:44:27] So it’s really based on that, that whole like human actions. Like, if you [00:44:34] just think about it, the most important thing in most of our lives is our phone. I mean, yes, our children, blah, blah, but you know, like a physical objects, it is our phone. I could lose my wallet and I would be way better off than if [00:44:48] I lost my phone.
[00:44:49] Um, because that has my life, much of my life in it. I can’t get anywhere without it. Well, the power of being in there every day or every week when they just open up their email and see it is a very powerful [00:45:02] connection that you can make with your stakeholders and with your donors. So you just want to be there.
[00:45:07] That’s really it. And yes, a lot of your emails are not gonna get opened and a lot of them are not going to get a high return rate when you’re initially sending them out. [00:45:16] That’s okay. The end goal is to get that donation and it might be more of a long play
[00:45:22] George: Oh, gosh. That’s, I mean, I could continue asking you these strategic questions. I think you’ve delivered a ton of value, burned so many mental calories, [00:45:30] and I’m afraid I’m going to have to move you into rapid fire and, and really just close this out please respond quickly to the following questions.
[00:45:38] I, we go. What is one tech tool or website that you or your organization has started using [00:45:44] the last year?
[00:45:45] Dr. JJ Peterson: Um, I would say I’m experimenting with AI a lot these days, so perplexity is, perplexity.ai is one that I’ve been using a lot.
[00:45:56] George: What are some tech issues you’re currently [00:45:58] battling with?
[00:45:59] Dr. JJ Peterson: ai. So in the marketing space, uh, we’re a lot of people are turning to AI and unfortunately it’s not delivering the results they want. And so we’re trying to figure out how do we actually engage with AI, not use it as like the [00:46:12] enemy, cause it’s not, but how do we actually use AI to help people grow their business and nonprofits?
[00:46:18] George: What is coming in the next year that has you the most excited?
[00:46:20] Dr. JJ Peterson: On a, on a little bit of a personal note, I’m going to it’s called the welcome [00:46:26] conference in New York by this guy named Will Gadara, and it’s all about hospitality and I would tell everybody on, I don’t know if this is another rapid fire question, but if there’s one book besides building a story brand that you should read this year, it’s called unreasonable [00:46:40] hospitality.
[00:46:41] That’s that book I would argue has changed the way I do other than story brands, the most important book I’ve ever read, to be honest.
[00:46:49] George: Talk about a mistake that you made earlier in your career that shapes the way you do things now.[00:46:54]
[00:46:55] Dr. JJ Peterson: Well, when I first started working for nonprofits, I really did think the only way to get people to donate is to make them cry. And so I actually like held back on sending out emails and [00:47:08] newsletters and things, because I was waiting for that one story that was really going to break everybody’s heart and move them to action.
[00:47:15] And so it was hard because I didn’t want to be manipulative. I didn’t want to. You know, be kind of like take advantage of the [00:47:22] people that we were serving and exploit their story in this process. And so it felt very confusing and overwhelming. And every time I’m writing an email or a newsletter or a website, I’m like, how do I do this without exploiting people?
[00:47:34] And so what I [00:47:36] realized now is I was actually making our organization, the hero of the story is that I was trying to make us be like the heroes really. And when I, it took me 20 years, but when I finally figured out that we’re not the hero of the story. Now I can go [00:47:50] into any nonprofit, even if I don’t know them very well, and I can help them write emails so quick and so clearly because I don’t carry that burden of trying to make us look good.
[00:47:59] I’m trying to invite people into a story that they get to be a part of and that they get to change [00:48:04] and the world gets to change because of it.
[00:48:07] George: Do you believe that nonprofits can successfully go out of business?
[00:48:11] Dr. JJ Peterson: Can successfully go out of business? I would hope a lot of them would because the problems that they solved are [00:48:18] done. That would be my hope, you know, in the sense of like, Oh, we’ve solved world hunger. Now we can successfully close our doors.
[00:48:27] George: If I could throw you in the old hot tub time machine, back to the beginning of your [00:48:32] work, what advice would you give yourself?
[00:48:34] Dr. JJ Peterson: Truthfully, don’t be afraid to ask people for money. That would probably be it. Like as my, in the very beginning, like I think again, I’m a college kid. I didn’t have very much money coming out of college. I was [00:48:46] working for nonprofit. And so I felt like anytime I asked people for money that I was being maybe manipulative or I was begging.
[00:48:54] And the reality is. When people get to be a part of transformational work that you’re doing in the [00:49:00] nonprofit space, their lives are better because of it. There’s actually a lot of research behind it that actually there’s one thing for you to get money. But when you give it away, it actually makes your life better.
[00:49:11] You experience more joy when you allow [00:49:14] other people to experience some of the joy you have. So I think I’d literally just tell myself beyond the whole hero thing, I would just say, Hey, don’t be afraid to ask people for money.
[00:49:24] George: What is something you think you should stop doing?
[00:49:27] Dr. JJ Peterson: Uh, [00:49:28] staying up too late.
[00:49:30] George: How did you get started in the social impact sector?
[00:49:32] Dr. JJ Peterson: Really I, I went on, well, my parents were missionaries in Kenya when I was little, so I did live in Africa for a while and was involved in a couple different nonprofits there, but really [00:49:42] I took a trip to Mexico to help build a home for a family and it changed my life forever.
[00:49:48] George: What advice would you give college grads currently looking to enter the social impact sector?
[00:49:55] Dr. JJ Peterson: Learn, [00:49:56] start by learning. I think, you know, what I do love about college kids, cause I was a Dean of students at a university is that they’ve got the energy and they’ve got the time to make a huge difference in the world. But also there’s a [00:50:10] lot of assumption that the things that you’re bringing to the table, nobody’s ever thought of or gone through before.
[00:50:15] So use your time, use your energy, use your passion, but learn a lot, learn a lot. It doesn’t mean you don’t do. [00:50:24] But learn a lot. Surround yourself with people who’ve been there and done that before you.
[00:50:29] George: What advice did your parents give you that you either followed or didn’t follow?
[00:50:34] Dr. JJ Peterson: Well, I’ll, I’ll take this into the faith. [00:50:38] Um, but my, my mom always said any criticism that you receive should draw you closer to Jesus because either it’s [00:50:52] true and you need to be humbled, or it’s not true. And you need to remember who you are. And so that was, I think, some incredible advice that my faith has changed significantly since then.
[00:51:02] So we can get into a whole conversation about that. But what [00:51:06] it really comes down to is the idea of that criticism itself is not the end game. Or something that should tear you down. It’s really an opportunity to either reflect and go, yeah, that’s true. I need to be humble. Or it goes, [00:51:20] yeah, that’s not true.
[00:51:21] I don’t need to listen to it.
[00:51:22] George: How do people find you? How do people help you?
[00:51:25] Dr. JJ Peterson: So in my world you can find me on the socials at Dr. JJ Peterson. And also you can go to my [00:51:34] story, brand. com. And what, what, how that will help me to be honest is that more nonprofits will be able to clarify their message. And at my story, brand. com, you can sign up for an account to get what we call an online [00:51:48] brand script.
[00:51:49] And it’s everything I just talked about today that you can go through and actually create the talking points for your organization. So it’s just a gift that we give to people, but it’s mystorybrand. com. You’ll sign up for an account and be able to [00:52:02] fill out transcripts yourself. And honestly, like we started StoryBrand with the idea that we want to give the good people, the microphones.
[00:52:10] We want to help people who are doing good things in the world. Make an even bigger difference because I can communicate with [00:52:16] people more clearly. So the way you can help me is by going there and then helping yourself.
[00:52:22] George: Mystorybrand. com. Thank you, Dr. JJ Peterson, for burning all of those mental calories and helping our audience. We appreciate you [00:52:30] and your work.
[00:52:31] Dr. JJ Peterson: Thanks so much.
