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A $6 million nonprofit loses all its funding overnight. What should it do? Red Rooster Group provides our recommendations.

PROBLEM

This nonprofit organization empowers after school programs around the state. Funded by the state department of education, the organization provides funding and support services to 45 after school programs, making it the leading organization of its kind in the state. When the economic and political client changed, the organization lost its $6 million annual budget, leaving it scrambling for its survival. The organization approached us with their bad news about their loss of funding and their decision to retrench quickly while keeping an eye on the small possibility of regaining its funding from the state next year.

A Plan for Offering Training Services

In order to bring in at least minimal income, the organization has decided to capitalize on its expertise in the operations of running after school programs and offer training and technical assistance as well as tutoring services on a fee basis. It anticipates revenues of $250,000 for these services, with the hopes of growing this to much larger revenue.

The training and technical assistance will take the form of different seminars marketed to the 45 current clients as well as other after school programs in the state. The sessions fulfill state training requirements, providing some marketing appeal. The tutoring programs face tough competition from well developed companies such as Sylvan,  Kaplan, and Kumon. Marketing these programs will be more of a challenge.

BRAND ASSESSMENT

The organization has an established brand — having invested in its core messages (supporting after school programs in the state), its logo, website, marketing materials, and annual awards conference — it enjoys a largely positive reputation. Its reputation also stems from having an evidence-based program (with a large-scale study conducted in 2009), and pre-eminence in the field of after school programs as the largest player in the state.

At this point, the organization’s core brand position as a funder of after school programs has been inverted — a critical part of its brand that will be difficult to overcome, but that must be addressed. Since the organization has built its reputation as an evidence-based program, it can play up that expertise. However, given that the study is now several years old, and that by its nature, the study doesn’t measure improvements in grades (a key indicator favored by legislators), it is difficult to trot this out as a core selling point. The organization, however, can leverage its expertise in understanding the core drivers of operations and performance of after school programming and tutoring, which is what it is doing by offering the seminars. Overall, the agency faces a huge challenge in convincing its audience of its staying power and selling its services long enough to stay in the game.

RECOMMENDATIONS

While assessing the situation from a marketing perspective, our recommendations touch upon all areas of the organization.

1. The Organization Must Re-acclimate Quickly

Given the huge funding deficit, the first imperative, of course, is to re-acclimate the organization immediately in order to bring revenue in as soon as possible. In order to survive, the organization will need to become of a different type of organization — from one that empowers and funds other organizations, to one that has an entrepreneurial and sales-oriented mindset. Given the small staff, this type of flexibility can be achieved with strong leadership and a plan that involves everyone in the organization about thinking about the mission and operations in a different way.

2. The Board Must Provide Leadership & Resources

The board needs to be an essential part of this strategic planning process of helping the organization to adapt to this new mindset. While the board consists of corporate executives that signed on to an organization funded through the grace of legislators, the board needs to step up and take a leadership role in navigating the organization through this transition to earned revenue. Strong leadership on the part of the board president will be required, as well as frank and open lines of communication with the Executive Director and other executive staff, as well as judicious decisions and swift execution.

Bringing a wealth of business experience and other social capital, the board is a resource that must be tapped at this point. It is essential for the Executive Director to solicit the support of the board president to help rally the board members around this cause. The board can provide direction, feedback and resources to address the immediate need, while also planning contingencies to regain state funding.

3. Communicate Quickly with Constituents

It is important to communicate with the after school programs about the situation as quickly as possible, particularly since they will no longer be receiving funding the organization, and will be asked to pay for services. While these conversations may not be easy, it is essential for them to happen as soon as possible.

4. Address the Audience’s Perspective

Our meeting with  the organization took place on a Wednesday, and they had a planned meeting with their constituents the next day. They shared their PowerPoint presentation with slides dedicated to each of the training programs and mentioned that they need to fulfill their state-mandated training requirements.

While the slides covered the essentials of each session, we recommended that they revisit the presentation from the audience’s perspective by identifying their pain points and describing how each session can address a specific need, and demonstrate a real benefit to them. We recommended an approach that works from a position of strength, and eases up on the threats.

5. Use Effective Design to Sell the Services

In terms of the design of the slides, we recommended leading with the key issues (or pain points) faced by after school programs and the describing how the training sessions can address those issues and lead to positive outcomes. Setting the title of the presentation in smaller type as a footer on every page, instead of as a headline on top, is more appropriate and will provide more space for the key message. We also recommended adding some visuals, photos or graphics.

We also recommended that the presentation set up the context of the new direction for the organization so that the training sessions are seen as something of value and not as opportunistic for NJ After 3.

6. Convey an Affinity with the Audience

We recommended that they leverage their organization’s strengths — based on the knowledge and expertise. Given their experience in being evaluated by neutral third-parties, the client identified that they could help after school programs to evaluate their programs.

7. Create a Dialogue to Get Input

We saw the opportunity to meet with their audience, despite the tight timing, as a chance to start the communications process. We urged them to use the meeting as a chance to get input about their overall approach and the specific seminars. It’s also an opportunity to have an open discussion about their needs — a mini focus group — to plan appropriately for sessions that will best meet their needs.
The seminars themselves also provide a great opportunity to learn more about what the audience needs. Informal feedback at the sessions, evaluation forms, and post-event surveys are all ways to solicit feedback about what the audience values.

8. Make Direct Contact with Customers

Sending out emails, flyers and postcards are necessary marketing tools, but in this case, the immediacy of sales for this school year, requires immediate action. In order to promote the programs on a limited budget, one on one calls to all the current and prospective clients will be essential.

9. Allocate Staff to this Sales Effort

In terms of staffing, despite their small staff of six, we think it is crucial to dedicate at least one staff person to the sales role to reach out to prospective clients and maintain a database or record of activity and feedback in order to adapt the sessions to attract more people.

10. Use Social Media as a Low Cost Way to Promote the Services

The organization’s social media presence is handled by a part-time associate how also handles the public relations. Strong and consistent outreach on LinkedIn, specifically through groups that after school programs would be members of.  We also recommended taking advantage of any opportunities for publicity by reaching out to the media in the state — newspapers, specialized publications and websites that would appropriate.

SUMMARY

The task of bailing out a sinking ship will not be easy. It will require the organization to adopt a new mindset, and quickly. One that is flexible, fast, and entrepreneurial minded. After years of being largely dependent upon a single funder, it must now earn its way. If done right, this transition can create an even stronger organization — one with more diverse funding sources, a larger client base, stronger relationships with its constituents, and a more engaged staff and board — in short, an organization that knows how to remain relevant in a changing landscape.

Howard Adam Levy, is Principal of Red Rooster Group, a New York based graphic design firm that creates effective brands, websites and marketing campaigns for nonprofits to increase their visibility, fundraising and communications effectiveness. Contact us at info@redroostergroup.com.

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