Is your organization on the right track this year? To help you find out, Wild Apricot’s Tatiana Morand breaks down nonprofit trends to look out for as your organization develops its marketing, tech, and leadership strategies for 2020.

When it comes to marketing, make communications personal.

“The days of blanket messaging to your audience are over,” Morand says. Instead, opt for personal tactics such as sharing stories about the people you serve and segmenting your email lists by previous interaction and interests.

If you’re looking to reach your audience in new ways this year, consider starting a podcast. To say they’re popular is an understatement: A Mailchimp study reports that more than 700,000 podcasts and 29 million podcast episodes were produced in 2019, while Edison Research’s Infinite Dial Study reports that more than half of Americans listen to podcasts, and about 32 percent listen monthly.

“Producing podcasts for your nonprofit is an important way to increase brand awareness,” Morand says.

Need to make internal changes at your nonprofit? Create a diverse leadership group so that leaders can better connect with your community and inspire members of your organization.

“Over the years, more and more nonprofits are making an effort to have inclusive leadership that represents the range of communities served, and the range of staff that make up the organization. This trend will continue through 2020,” Morand says.

How to Onboard Your Board

Tips for a Successful Nonprofit Board Orientation Program https://t.co/tdRBoqFC2o via @gregory_nielsen pic.twitter.com/64fflXyuQp

— bloomerang (@bloomerangTech) February 19, 2020

Board members are a vital piece of any association, but your organization might not be doing enough to help them succeed, suggests Gregory Nielsen on the Bloomerang blog.

“We often spend a lot of time discussing our expectations of board members and where we will look to recruit these leaders but far less time on how we will ensure that they are put in a position to excel once they join the team,” he says.

That’s where board orientation comes in. Develop an orientation program that takes new board members through the history of your organization, its structure, current projects, goals, and strategic direction.

Other Links of Note

What do you do, and why do you do it? Defining your work could give it greater meaning, writes Jeffrey Cufaude on the Idea Architects blog.

Event spending is on the rise, says a recent study from Thinkwell. Event Marketer highlights that and other important insights from the report.

Happy birthday, Photoshop. The Verge takes us back 30 years for a glance at what the software looked like when it was first released.

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