Communicating Your Message in Your Nonprofit Organization’s Annual Report

Help your audience of clients, donors, and others to understand your message and the impact your organization has by using infographics, maps, and other techniques. These examples are drawn from the annual reports and publications that Red Rooster Group has created for our clients.

1. Showcasing Impact

In this example, our client, UMFS, a social service agency in Virginia, wanted to communicate the impact they had across a range of areas. To reinforce the organization’s brand message, the infographics are introduced as examples of the organization’s five core values. The infographics use large numbers as a focal point, and icon-style graphics to illustrate the points. The graphics were used both in a printed brochure, as well as on their website, which we also created, and are designed to be seen on a mobile device.

2. Unifying Diverse Information

When you have a diverse set of information to present, as we did in this annual report for Student Advocacy, you need to bring focus and consistency. In this case, we used a silhouetted color photograph of students as the focal point illustrating the demographics of the population they served, and used a color palette of gray, yellow, and white to create unity among all the elements. The graphics are not that complex, but they create enough variety to maintain interest throughout the pages. The map does double duty, showing both the locations served, and the number of students at each location.

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3. Sharing Results

In this publication for the Junior League Washington, DC, a nonprofit organization that relies on volunteer members to perform public service, the results of a member survey are shared through a bar chart, pie chart and impact scale. Color is restrained to unify the elements.

A simple timeline shows dates in the organization’s history. Tight editing is required to fit the text in each section.

4. Creating Graphic Interest

In the annual report for this educational organization, 9 stats and 2 quotes are designed into a grid. Numbers are enlarged as focal points for each section, while photos are kept small.

5. Impact & Events

For the annual report for Pratham USA, a nonprofit organization that raises funds for the largest literacy organization in India, impact numbers were run together to form a block, with the numbers larger and red to stand out.

To showcase the organization’s events around the country, we used a map as the central focus, framing it with photos and captions, with lines to their respective cities.

Preparation for a photo shoot is a critical part of creating good photos, according to Jason Gardner, a photographer experienced in both nonprofit and corporate photography. Proper planning will maximize the effectiveness of the photos while minimizing costs.

Photos catch the eye and pull your audience into your  website, annual report, marketing brochure or Case for Support. Make sure that you know what you want the photos to say as well as the technical parameters of what you need — horizontal, vertical, color, high resolution, etc. Professional photographers can help you figure all this out and guide you in setting up compelling rather than ho-hum images.

A conference before the photo shoot, either in person or via conference call, can help you home in on what you need, help the photographer decide what equipment to bring, and ensure the turnaround you need. During the conference, you can discuss the emotion you want the photos to evoke and the purpose of the photos. Knowing the answers to the questions below will result in better photos and also give you a more accurate assessment of how much the shoot will cost.

• Strategic Direction: What do you want the photo to accomplish?
• Message: What do you want the photos to convey?
• Audience: Whose attention do you want to grab with the photo? What is the demographic of your audience?
• Vision: What does “good photo” mean to you? Show the photographer examples of photos you like. Help the photographer “see” what you have in mind.
• Usage: Where will the photo be used? Online, in print, in social media, sent to the press? All of the above? The color system for these uses is different so it’s important to know ahead of time.
• Timing: Do you need photos immediately to send out with press releases or are these for a long-term upgrade of your website? What’s the deadline?
• Number: How many photos do you want out of this shoot? If it’s a gala or other event, do you need a photo of every board member and every major donor? If the photos are documentary or marketing, how many photos will you need for each purpose?

Another helpful tip from Jason: If you do want pictures of particular people at the gala, such as every board member, help the photographer find them. Give the board members special name tags or provide a guide to point out the people who must be photographed.

After the event or the photo shoot, the photographer will go through the images, selecting those that meet your criteria. You’ll then have to go through the images to decide which you like, whether you want them cropped, and where you’ll use them. Conferring with the photographer at this point is useful, to make sure that the cropped proportions and other technical requirements are met. When your selection has been made, the photographer will provide the images in the formats needed.

Images that make your audience take a second look and entice them to keep reading your website, brochure, or newsletter are valuable additions to your marketing.

Stand out. Differentiate. Distinguish. Your logo’s job is to be noticed. It is the basis for the visual identity that engages interest and makes your organization memorable.

What qualities in a logo make it grab attention and endure? Don’t base the design of your organization’s logo on your own instincts and opinion or, in your haste to get started, just grab a piece of clip-art and forge ahead. You want a logo that creates an emotional response in your audiences — clients, donors, members, staff — both current and potential. You want a logo that conveys what your organization stands for. It’s not a clip-art process, it’s an iterative creative process in which little things mean a lot.

Images have meaning, either inherently (wings denoting flight) or symbolically (dove representing peace). Meaning is attributed to color (red for danger or passion) but that meaning varies from culture to culture.

By vetting designs against the criteria used by professionals, you’re more likely to create a single, clear, direct image that will embody the character and aspirations of your organization and set it apart from the crowd of visuals begging for attention. These seven tips will help you create an effective logo that does get the attention of those whose support you want.

Inherent Meaning

What does the symbol represent to most people, especially those in the audiences you want to reach? Be careful of cultural differences here. Does it visually appeal to the values of those audiences, whether they be professionals or children? Does it convey the core concepts of your organizations, such as its level of professionalism or its friendliness?

Appropriateness

A logo must be appropriate to the ideas and activities it represents. But it must also be appropriate to the media in which it will be used. A design that will flash by on a screen has to meet different requirements than one that will be mounted on the wall of a building. Additionally, the level of exposure is pivotal — if a logo will have wide exposure, more liberties can be taken in with it.

Legibility 

Demonstrate how a proposed design will appear in actual use. By itself, isolated on a page, the effect of a design can be deceptive. It is much more informative to show the logo in a range of realistic applications: large and small, in color and black-and-white, and in various media from rough faxes to seamless computer animations. Also, try it out in various sizes, such as on a business card and on a banner, to make sure the proportions work well on any scale and that the design is clear, even when small.

Consistency 

Achieve continuity by providing strict guidelines for the use of all basic identity elements: color, typography, symbols, and imagery. Bypass rigid formulas for all applications in favor of flexible graphic systems that are well suited to such applications as advertising and the web where change is part of the expression. But make sure that all staff are trained to use the basic elements correctly.

Flexibility

Flexibility is critical. For an identity to maintain vitality and relevance over time, its visual language must be adaptable, and ready to evolve in ways that cannot be predicted. Logos were once static. Now they can be animated. Your organization may add programs or locations that need their own identity while maintaining connection to the overall organization. A good logo will be part of a brand system that allows such growth.

Memorability

To be effective, a logo’s forms must be familiar enough to be recognizable yet unusual enough to be memorable. This requires a very careful balance. The design must be simple enough to be read in an instant, yet rich enough in detail or meaning to be interesting and engaging. An unusual combination of symbols can accomplish this, such as the candle and barbed wire logo of Amnesty International. Beware of visual cliches! How many nonprofit logos have caring hands or circles of people holding hands? Too many! Make you logo distinctive.

Endurance 

Take the long view in designing a logo so that it is contemporary enough to reflect its epoch yet not so trendy as to appear dated before the decade is over. However appealing the logo du jour may be, fashion has no place in trademark design. It is best to avoid visual trends that will appear dated in a few years. For longevity, stick with typefaces that have stood the test of time.

The more interesting and professional your visual image, the more likely it is that your organization’s name and purpose will stick in people’s minds. The logo sets the stage for your organization’s overall visual identity. This is an investment in your brand that you want to get right the first time so that you don’t have to redo it later.

• Click here to see examples of Red Rooster Group’s logo design.

 

In a world in which people need to absorb information quickly, nonprofits can take advantage of smart design to attract their audiences. Infographics are visual tools for presenting complex information or data in an easily digestible way. They can help create awareness, explain your programs, show impact, and engage your donors and other constituents in memorable ways. Infographics are especially good online marketing and social media tools — they can be easily viewed, distributed, and shared. Because you have the ability to link your infographic to a website, you can use these visuals to generate more inbound traffic to your organization’s site.

Below are 5 tips that nonprofits can use to turn their information into effective infographics.

1. Use Maps

Use maps to display information that has a geographic basis. Here, we have used a map to show the number of children served by an advocacy organization. Displaying the information in this way allows people to quickly find patterns in the data, such as what area serves the most children, where the organization has the most impact, etc.

2. Use Flowcharts for Systems & Processes

Use a visual flowchart to breakdown a system or a process for your audience. Highlight the steps with interesting visuals that will provide a quick summary of the content, and generate enough interest for the viewer to want to read the accompanying text. Here, we have illustrated the process of using project management software for the clients of a contractor.

3. Show Impact with Numbers

Using numbers will help illustrate your impact to an audience in a very clear and quantifiable way. Make the numbers themselves bigger than the surrounding text so they will stand out and invite further reading. Pair numbers with illustrations and/or photos for added visual interest.

4. Present Data in Interesting Ways

Use a variety of formats to display your information — traditional pie charts and bar graphs are good, but try to think of other more interesting ways to break down your data. Below, the data for “Parent Evaluations of Children’s Progress” would have made a dull bar graph since the percentages are very similar. So instead, we illustrated the evaluations, highlighting the percentages individually.

5. Entertain to Engage

Infographics can be an opportunity to have fun — and to better engage your audience and entice them to take action. Below, instead of simply listing an organization’s volunteer opportunity for teens, we created a flowchart asking them questions about their interests and pointing them to specific volunteer opportunities.

 1. Suggest Donation Amounts

Provide a suggested donation amount to help increase giving levels. Use concrete examples of what each level of a donation may go towards.

> http://www.jfsmetrowest.org/get-invovled/donate

2. Feature Testimonials

Provide donor profiles and testimonials, allowing potential donors to know that they fit in with others supporting the organization. 

> http://www.uwstark.org/donor-testimonials

3. Show Sponsor and Foundation Logos

Show logos of corporate sponsors and foundation funders to create visual interest, quicker recognition and impact. If appropriate, you can categorize sponsors by giving level or display the number of years they have been supporting your organization,or describe their relationship with you to show a strong, stable base of support and commitment by funders. 

Large sponsors are accompanied by a description of their relationship with Pratham (photo top). Other sponsors are represented by their logos  (bottom).

> http://prathamusa.org/about-us/our-supporters

4. Ensure That Your Site is Mobile-Ready

Make sure that information displays in a way that can be read easily on different devices and that the donation form works well on those devices. 

> http://www.givingfuel.com/features/mobile-giving

5. Include Listings and Endorsements

Make sure your listings on Guidestar, Charity Navigator and Better Business Bureau are accurate and include third-party endorsements of financial stewardship and assurances of secure online donation transactions on your donation page, if appropriate. 

6. Use Photos with a Headline and Caption

Add visual appeal to your donation by using photos and headlines that summarize your mission and convey the impact of the funds raised.

> http://www.icsf-nyc.org/donte.cfm

7. Demonstrate Impact Visually

If possible, create a graphic showing how donated funds are leveraged to achieve greater impact. For example:

 

8. Thank You Page

Have a robust “Thank You” page that is triggered after a donation is made and that encourages donors to get involved in your organization in other ways, such as volunteering or attending an upcoming event. 

This donation page solicits social media engagement.

> http://blog.bellstrike.com/page/3

Best Practices

An example of a a donation landing page that received high remarks in one study is shown below. The main column features pictures, graphics and an aesthetically pleasing form. Additional ways to engage donors are featured in the right sidebar. Note the 3 different assurances to donors below the submit button.

> http://nonprofit.about.com/od/onlinefundraising/ss/The-Final-Test-Donor-Pages-That-Convert_2.htm

Here is another example of a clean, easy to navigate donation page. Note the large video and description of the organization in the main column, the campaign goal and graphics showing the number of donations on the top right, the descriptions of donations levels and tabs for “one time”, “monthly” and “gift honor of” options.

Especially in countries like the United States that are becoming more and more diverse, understanding the unique beliefs, practices and values of different cultures can improve marketing tactics and target a larger audience. In this article, we discuss understanding cultural meanings of various symbols and how this affects the implementation of appropriate marketing strategies.

Benefits of Understanding Cultural Meanings of Symbols

A symbol is anything that carries meaning and represents something else by association. It is essential to understand how the meanings of symbols can change in different cultures to avoid controversy, misunderstandings, misinterpretations, and negative reactions. By taking the time to discern these meanings, we can understand the culture better, show respect to that culture, and convey the appropriate and intended message to the target audience. This process has been termed ‘intercultural accommodation’: the attempt to adjust or familiarize oneself with people belonging to a different culture in order to improve communication.

Blunders in intercultural communication occur when marketers do not take the time to understand and respect the values of their constituents. For an American telephone company, a commercial that featured a Latina wife telling her husband to call a friend and tell them they would be late was ineffective because the company failed to recognize that Latina women do not typically order their husbands.

Color Symbolism in Different Cultures

Color is one of the first elements to consider in designing an effective marketing campaign. It can hold a fundamental role in the beliefs and practices of various cultures, but often the symbolic meaning of a color varies drastically from culture to culture, and can sometimes even have exactly the opposite meaning in one culture from its meaning in another culture.

White

In Western cultures, white is generally a symbol of peace, purity, and innocence. Think of people who normally wear white, and some of the first that may come to mind are brides, angels or doctors. In Eastern cultures, however, it is generally a symbol of death, and probably wouldn’t have the same associations as it does in the West.

Interestingly, vocabulary for color can also be influenced by climate. For example, Eskimos use 17 words for white as applied to different snow conditions.

Yellow

We think of yellow as a color that symbolizes happiness and hope, but yellow has an even broader range of connotations globally, such as honor and courage (Japan), mourning (Egypt and Burma), merchants (India), joy and wealth (Middle East), aristocracy and prominent figures (Africa), and royalty (Thailand).

Orange

Orange is utilized symbolically in the U.S. as a color of road hazards and traffic delays, but in Asia, it represents quite the opposite. Orange is considered a life-affirming color of positivity and spiritual enlightenment.

Animal Symbolism in Different Cultures

Spanning many centuries and cultures, animals have represented a wide range of concepts, including gods and royalty, the supernatural, and have even indicated distinct personality traits.

Horse

In the Hindu religion, the horse is associated with the cosmos. The Romans would sacrifice a horse to Mars (the god) once every year in October and keep its tail, a symbol of fertility and rebirth, throughout the winter. Native American tribes associated the horse with wisdom and freedom and respected the horse for its role as a messenger. Contrastingly, the Chinese associate the horse with stability, endurance, and persistence. Today, Greco-Romans and Celtic nations consider the horse a symbol of war, as well as victory, courage, longevity, power, and honor.

Grasshopper

Native Americans believe that when a grasshopper is seen, the individual who encountered the grasshopper will soon receive good news. In Chinese culture, the grasshopper is similarly viewed as a very positive symbol. It represents longevity, good luck, fertility, wealth, and virtue. In some parts of China, grasshoppers were kept as pets in homes, where they were believed to embody the souls and spirits of deceased family members. In Ancient Greece, grasshoppers represented nobility, status, and immortality.

Cats

In the U.S. and most of Europe, if a black cat crosses your path, it is primarily associated with bad luck and witchcraft. However, in the United Kingdom, black cats are symbols of good luck; if a black cat entered your home, it would be perceived as a sign of good luck and would be kept in the home to ensure safety. Cat were even more revered in Egypt where they were considered a symbol of grace and poise. In Ancient Rome, the cat was a domestic symbol and was considered the guardian of homes.

Evidently, even today, cultures maintain very different meanings and symbolic importances of animals. Once again, a marketing failure can be avoided by respecting the different cultural beliefs and opinions regarding animals. In the 1970s, an aftershave for men was marketed in the Middle East and featured a man and a dog in a rural scene. However, the product did not sell well in Islamic countries, where dogs are not considered to be ‘man’s best friend,’ and are, rather, viewed as dirty animals.

The Effect of Language On Perception

Language can directly affect how the people of various cultures perceive their surroundings. The Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis theorizes that a person’s language determines and limits what he or she experiences. Not all concepts can be expressed in some languages, creating a language barrier that can affect, for example, one’s perception of color. The Shona language in Zimbabwe and the Boas language in Liberia have no words to distinguish red from orange, so people of these cultures often fail to recognize a difference between the two colors.

To avoid basic marketing errors, it is critical to have a deep understanding of a culture’s first language if it is different from your own. Words that have a positive meaning or no meaning in one culture can have a negative meaning in another. In the 1970s, when American Motors tried to market the Matador, its new car, to Puerto Rican consumers, sales were extremely low because Matador translated to ‘killer.’ In another instance, a major golf ball manufacturer developed special packaging for export to Japan with sets of four golf balls. When sales were lower than expected, they later found that in Japan, four is pronounced ‘shi’ which is the same pronunciation as the word ‘death.’ The Japanese consider the number to be bad luck, and houses and flats in Japan containing the number four are usually given to foreigners.

Visual Perception in Different Cultures

Cognitive and perceptual processes are constructed through participation in cultural practices. Research has found that East Asian perception is more holistic and that people from Eastern cultures are more likely to attend to the context of an image, while Westerners are more likely to attend to, perceive, and remember the attributes of salient objects in an image. Therefore, culture can affect the layout and design of an advertisement or brochure. If the consumers are from East Asian countries, they are more likely to recall the advertisement as a whole, whereas consumers from Western countries are more likely to remember a few distinct, often centralized, images within an advertisement.

Cultures can also differ in visual perception of writing. One important note to remember is that, while English readers read from left to right, we easily forget that this is not the order that all languages read. When consumers in the Middle East were shown a series of pictures depicting someone feeling ill, taking medication and then feeling better, they read it from right to left, and took the meaning to be feel good, take medicine, feel sick. Not exactly the intended message.

 

Communication Styles Across Cultures

Differences in individual perception and construction of meaning are fundamentally rooted in the values and beliefs of a culture. Edward T. Hall theorized that these values can be separated into two distinct categories based upon the background and surrounding circumstances in which communication takes place. People in high context cultures, such as Thailand, know and can understand one another well enough to be able to communicate effectively without always relying on words and other explicit forms of communication. In low context cultures, such as the U.S., because of the many cultural differences among people that exist, it is hard to rely on forms of communications that are not explicit and thus they often rely on the literal interpretation of words.

Whether they are targeting consumers in high context or low context cultures, marketers are bound to utilize various elements (color, language, animals, images, etc.) that hold symbolic meanings, and to establish effective intercultural communication, it is critical to be aware of and to respect the ways in which these meanings can differ.

CLIENT: SummX: Summit for Educational Foundation Excellence

When the Utah Association of Public Schools and the American School Foundation Alliance decided to produce the first major conference for educational foundations in the region, they needed a name for the conference that would help it establish immediate credibility. We generated a list of names that were short enough to be catchy and memorable, and unique enough to have an available domain name. The recommended name, SummX is only 5 letters, and we were able to claim the domain name summx.org.

We then designed a unique look for the conference materials that would help it get noticed. The branding system for the event is flexible enough to allow for different images and configurations of the typography so that it can stay fresh, while the maintaining recognition for the event with the colors and overall look. The design was applied to a printed postcard, email blasts, brochure mailer, conference website, and signage at the event.

CLIENT: Sephardic Bikur Holim

To thank its donors and supporters with a last minute appeal for donations, we created this email that explained the impact that this multi-service agency had during the year.

The mail used some best practices for the design of nonprofit fundraising appeal emails and design:

1. Clearly Identifiable Header

A header that clearly identifies the organization and shows the range of activities that SBH is involved in. In this  case, we made sure to represent a cross section of the types of people involved in the organization, including age and gender, involved in different volunteering activities. The overall look, colors, and typefaces in the email reinforce the organization’s brand to help supporters recognize the organization’s communications as coming from SBH.

2. Emotional Story

The email opens with actual email that SBH received describing an emotional experience that an observer had about the organization’s work.

3. Statistics

We presented selected statistics that showed the agency’s overall impact in a variety of areas. The statistics are designed in a clean way to highlight the numbers and create a strong visual presence to focus the reader.

4. The Appeal

The “ask” starts by thanking donors for their contributions and reminding them how the organization relies on their support. Mentioning that SBH has been around for 40 years builds the credibility that the organization is not fly-by-night or about to go out of business. And of course, there is a large and clear Donate button that is easy to find and does compete with many other elements.

5. Footer

The footer area contains the organization’s logo and a short mission statement (short enough that someone might actually read it), followed by contact information, and the organization’s divisions, a relatively new feature that we have been introducing for the organization as a way of gaining named sponsorships for each division.

Whoever said that print is dead, didn’t get the memo; it’s alive and thriving and is helping nonprofit organizations to reach their audiences in an effective way. While many organizations have transitioned their print publications to electronic formats, some are bucking the trends and reaping the rewards. Consider these examples:

1. Magazine Promotes Social Service Agency

A social service agency recently launched a magazine to meet three strategic goals: improve awareness of the organization’s services to those might need help, to increase volunteering efforts, and to increase donations to the agency. The magazine was organized around their nine divisions — each had a section in the magazine — to build named sponsorship support for each of the divisions. The publication plays a key role in the organization’s overall marketing outreach strategy to increase the viability of the organization, and has become a vehicle to build corporate support for the organization.

2. Special Needs School Attracts Referrals Through Its Newsletter

A special needs school that serves students with emotional and behavioral disabilities gets its students from school districts that can’t meet those students’ needs. In order to encourage the school districts to refer students to the school, a newsletter was launched to help the districts to understand what types of students they can help, and to encourage them make a referral at any time during the school year. The newsletter comes out three time a year and has been effective at increasing student enrollment.

3. Camp Launches Alumni Association with a Magazine

A camp feels that it can tap into its alumni for financial support and launches an alumni association with a 12-page magazine. The magazine plays a key role in the marketing by describing the alumni association and its dues structure, and featuring articles on its alumni and events. The printed magazine is supplemented by an email newsletter, with content also being used on the alumni section on the camp’s website. The magazine is successful in bringing in money, and attracting members at all levels, including the highest level— lifetime members — as well as boosting the credibility of the camp for potential new campers.

4. Private School Uses Newsletter as a Recruitment Tool

A private school produces a newsletter for parents of seventh graders are deciding where to send their kids to high school. Developed as a specific recruitment piece for increasing 8th grade enrollment, the newsletter bridges information about the school useful in recruiting and more topical news about school happenings over the past semester. To help parents understand the school’s strengths the newsletter is organized around thematic areas such as Science and Technology, Career Prep, and Enrichment, to showcase the vibrancy of the institution’s offerings in various areas.

As these examples show, organizations with a range of marketing objectives can benefit from print publications that build visibility and support on many fronts. So is a print publication right for your organization? Here are some factors to take into account:

5. Make Sure You Have A Clear Purpose

Do you know what you want the publication to accomplish? Each of the organizations above had very specific goals they were looking to achieve, and created publications to meet those goals. Before starting your publication, you need to know that your goals can be best accomplished through a printed publication rather than through some other media or method. For example, in recruiting volunteers, if you are looking to reach kids in college to help you at your events, then social media might be a better way to go. But if you are looking to reach retired executives to provide counseling for your clients, they might appreciate a print publication that describes how their values and expertise can benefit others.

6. Make Sure the Investment is Worth It

Determine how much it is worth investing in the publication in order to reach your objective. How much value it can bring, whether in real dollars, of improved perception about your organization should be the basis for deciding how much to spend on your publication. For example, increasing the amount of money raised is an easy goal to quantify. For other goals, such as recruiting more volunteers, you can look at the total amount of time they will be volunteering. For less-tangible objectives, such as building your organization’s credibility as experts in a particular area, you can look at new partnerships, policy changes, or other benefits that may result from the publication.

7. Make Sure That You Have the Necessary Commitment

Starting a publication on a regular basis requires that you have the organizational commitment to doing so. To be effective, issuing your publication one time, won’t cut it — you need to be committed to an ongoing schedule. Once you start publishing, your audience will expect it. So determine whether your organization has the wherewithal to produce the publication on a regular basis. Make it an organizational priority, assign someone with authority to the task, and create systems of making it easy to gather content and produce the publication, whether done in-house or outside.

8. Make Sure That You Have Enough News

Does your organization have enough news to support a publication with the frequency that you want (for example, a 12-page quarterly newsletter)? It’s likely it does if you look hard enough at all the activities that your organization does. But if you will be struggling for content, them pare back the frequency or number of pages so that you can produce your publication easily without trying to search for content. Also, look for ways to gather content or have staff and board suggest content an ongoing basis so you will have a large pool to draw from.

9. Make Sure That Your Audience Is Interested

Are your constituents likely to read something that your organization produces? One way to find out is to ask them. Conduct a survey about the best way that your clients, donors, members, or other constituents want to hear from you, or incorporate it into your registration, online donation, or membership forms. There is no sense in producing a publication that no one is interested in reading.

If you have determined that it is worth investing in a print publication, check out Part Two of this series, Creating an Effective Print Publication.

CLIENT: The Jewish Education Project

We created an info sheet and PowerPoint presentation to provide an update to funders on the effectiveness of this program in creating innovative models of Jewish education.

Summary Sheet

We designed a summary sheet that was used as a handout during the presentation. The sheet makes it easy to funders to learn about the program using best practices for nonprofit design.

Images: A large photo provides a focal point, draws people in,and shows the main outcomes of the program — families learning together. Photos on the back of the sheet show educators coming together to learn in the organization’s program, and kids and families.

Headline: A main headline is used to deliver the news, the outcome of the programs: Transforming the Way Children Experience Judaism.  Too often, nonprofits just use their organizational or program name, which don’t tell what the organization is actually achieving.

Statistics: We highlighted 3 statistics on the front of the brochure to show the full impact of the program.

Copy: The copy is compelling in describing not only the program, but in depicting the various outcomes and painting a picture of how the scenario will be different with the organization’s continued involvement.

Infographics: To show the organization’s three main services to educators, we depicted them as icons for visual representation and appeal.

It’s one litte sheet that does a lot.

> Download a PDF of the sheet

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Presentation

The presentation was designed to visually-engage the audience with photos, charts, and infographics. None of the pages contain traditional bullet point style — each slide was designed to communicate a specific point, from the visual depiction of the programs through a series of full screen images, to the charts and graphics that depict the programs and results. A uniform color palette and typography unify the presentation.

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Results

Overall, the presentation helped to strengthen the relationship with the funder by showing where the program was succeeding, and what work still needed to be done — a recommended practice for any nonprofit that is looking for renewed funding from a particular source. This is an example of how nonprofits can use best practices in graphic design to help tell their story effectively.