Day 1 of the How To Create Meaningful Constituent Relationships Webinar featured Heller Consulting who spoke about creating strategies to help you deepen your nonprofits relationships with their constituents. Here's the full webinar, for your viewing pleasure: <a />video on Vimeo</a>

1. Presents
How to create meaningful
constituent relationships
December 3, 2013

2. The Connected Cause is a place for experts in the nonprofit
online space to share perspective, offer guidance and
promote best practices for using today’s technology
effectively. Our goal is to provide a comprehensive source of
collaborative thought leadership for the nonprofit industry.
TheConnectedCause.com
@TheConnectCause
TheConnectedCause

3. Today’s Experts
Jenn Smith
Vice President, Digital
Agency
Chris Goodman
SVP, Strategic Planning and
Marketing
For 17 years Heller Consulting
has focused exclusively on building
technical and strategic solutions for
nonprofits to connect their systems,
team, and community.
With 40 years nonprofit technology
experience, the 2DIALOG solution
holistically supports the multichannel
needs of nonprofit organizations to help
improve the fundraising experience.
TeamHeller.com
2Dialog.com

4. About Heller Consulting & our expertise
17 Years Experience, 900 Clients, 1,800 projects
San Francisco, Chicago, Austin, New York, Boston
20+ Salesforce.com-certified, 6+ PMP Certified Staff
Exclusively Serving Nonprofits | TeamHeller.com
Connecting your systems
•
•
•
CRM planning and
software selection
Systems Implementation
Optimizing your
current software
Connecting your team
•
•
•
Bringing people and
process together
Change management solutions
Team configuration and training
Connecting your
community
•
•
•
Social Media strategy
Building online communities
Activating supporters

5. Let’s talk a little about great relationships…
 Make a great first
impression
 Be a good listener
 Keep in touch
 Tell the truth
 Exchange great stories
 Ask for help and return
the favor

6. What gets in the way of creating great
relationships?
Internal
Resources
External
Technology

7. It’s time to change our approach.

8. Isolated approach
• Siloed Systems
• Same constituents
in different systems
• Miscommunication,
missed opportunity,
poor relationships

9. A better approach
• Step back from data
and systems
• Put your Constituents
at the center
• How do we want to
relate to our
constituents and staff?
• How do we want them
to relate to us?
• How can we do
more together?

10. The ideal approach
• Interactions and
initiatives are guided
by an overall
strategy
Online
Engagement
• Systems are aligned,
one record per
constituent
Donor
Mission
• Each effort within the
strategy is related to
and influenced by
the other parts

11. Getting to the ideal approach
Plan
Define
goals
Get
buy-in
Match
tech &
resources
to goals

12. Define Goals
Internal
Relationship (outward)
Know your benchmarks
Understand how reaching your
goals serves your constituents
Define your KPI’s
Know how you’ll continue to
engage and build a relationship
after a goal is met
Understand how to measure
against those KPI’s
Articulate less measurable, but
relationship-centered goals
Think beyond obvious goals
(10,000 new fans on Facebook)!
Ask why.

13. Make a plan
Internal
Relationship (outward)
What steps do you need to take
internally to be successful?
How frequently will you engage
with your constituents? On what
channels?
Identify your obstacles and how
you can address them.
What value will you offer to your
constituents? How will you help
them?
Think all the way to the end:
What happens when you are
successful?
Know specifically how to ask
them for help, input, etc.
Once you’ve gathered data, what
will you do with it, how will it
change your approach?
Understand how your
organization can leverage data to
better build these relationships.

14. Get buy-in
Internal
Relationship (outward)
Make sure everyone is on-board
with goals and plan.
Solicit feedback and opinions –
even for something “beta”.
Establish and set realistic
expectations for success.
Communicate your vision and
goals and how to be involved.
Openly communicate with
leadership and staff the vision,
goals and plan. Accept feedback.
Listen! But don’t get too
distracted by what people say
they want.
KIT Forever! Keep communication
open through all phases of the
work – not just beginning and
end.

15. Match tech & resources to goal
Internal
Relationship (outward)
A strong CRM makes it all easier;
know specifically what you
want/need to get out of your data
to reach your goals.
Know where your constituents
already are and communicate via
chosen methods/channels
Worth repeating: Work towards
integrated data to avoid silos.
Keep it personal – find the tools
that will allow you the most
flexibility/efficiency in terms of
connecting with your constituents
Determine how new solutions can
help with goals, not now to just
implement new solutions
Understand how goals can be
achieved with technology vs.
content, marketing or
communications
You don’t have to be everywhere or
do everything – choose, and make
your choices based on data
Allow resources to shift as your
constituents change

16. Follow this cycle to keep building great relationships
Plan
Execute/
Test
Repeat!
Evaluate
Revise

17. Preview of Tomorrow’s Presentation

18. Tomorrow – Tools and Technology
• Components of integrated solutions that support
relationship-focused strategies
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–
–
–
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CRM
Ecommunications
Integrated Payment Gateways
Peer-to-peer fundraising
Advocacy
Events
Dynamic Content
Reference code tracking and analytics
Segmentation

19. Questions
Further Reading
• The Connected Cause has several whitepapers available
that cover the topics of CRM and Software Solutions written
by Heller Consulting and Idealware.org
Heller Consulting
Heller Consulting
Heller Consulting
Idealware.org
Integrated Suites
For Nonprofits
The New World of
Donor Management
Apps for Nonprofits
Insights into CRM
for Nonprofits
A Consumers Guide
to Donor
Management Systems

20. Tomorrow – Tools and Technology
**REMINDER**
Tomorrow at noon (central time) Chris Goodman of
2DIALOG will review integrated technology
solutions that will best support your relationshipfocused strategies.

21. TheConnectedCause.com
@TheConnectCause
TheConnectedCause
Host: Bryan Giese - info@theConnectedCause.com
Jenn Smith
jsmith@TeamHeller.com
Chris Goodman
cgoodman@2DIALOG.com