So you’ve nailed down your brand identity. Congratulations – that’s a big accomplishment!

You’ve spent the last several weeks, months or maybe even years developing and fine-tuning your vision, mission and target audience. You’ve established your brand personality and determined the best colors, fonts and visual elements to include in your marketing materials. 

Now what?

Do you focus on social media? Is email marketing a thing of the past or more important than ever? How needed are in-person events at this early stage? 

Keep scrolling to read what we’ve learned through implementing brand strategies for our own clients:

Social media can be time-consuming, and if you have an older support base, you might be thinking it isn’t worth it for your organization. But in the digital age, social media is vital, especially if you know how to lean into its strengths: awareness and community.

Frequent posts sharing more about your staff, your mission and your outreach remind your followers you are active in your community. Using photos, videos and stories add a personal touch on top of other infographics, statistics or facts you share. 

In addition, different social media platforms engage different age groups, so the more you can cross-post, the more you’re reaching every corner of your audience. To save time, you can utilize a social media management platform such as Buffer, Loomly or Hootsuite to post across platforms simultaneously.

As you develop your strategy, focus on building an online community that allows your audience to see your brand’s personality and mission. You can — and should — include calls to action for donations or volunteers, but remember that social media’s purpose is primarily to connect within the confines of the app.

In our experience with our nonprofit clients, email marketing still has an edge on social media for bringing in donors or encouraging participation in upcoming events.

With this medium, your strategy is different. 

Your email recipients already know who you are — they signed up, after all! So don’t take up valuable “real estate” with long sections explaining your mission. Instead, use this format to share longer impact stories that reinforce the mission your recipients already know and love. 

Once you’ve established your organization’s impact, be clear about how you’re asking your audience to respond.

Ask yourself: How can they make a specific difference? 

Then condense that need into a concise statement such as:

• One gift of $20 can feed a family of four.
• Volunteering two hours a week to watch children allows single parents to attend life skills classes.
• Becoming a monthly donor, even at just $10 a month, helps us cover operating expenses and put more funds toward our mentorship program.

Don’t forget to include links and buttons to make it easy for recipients to take the next step in their support!

Social media connects you with a broader audience, and email marketing encourages tangible audience support. Both reflect your organization’s brand and personality well. 

But YOU can do it even better!

Consider hosting a few meet-ups throughout the year or planning larger-scale fundraisers or events. These in-person opportunities can be the tipping point for supporters who found you through your website or social media. Maybe they subscribed to your newsletter, too. 

When given the opportunity to meet the people they support, the stories they heard become even more real. 

One conversation with you just might convince them that their time or support will make a big difference!

Now it’s time to finalize your strategy and start implementing it!

Every organization has different goals and audiences, but we’ve found all of our clients benefit from this three-pronged approach. 

Maybe 40% of the marketing budget goes into social media for one organization while another finds email marketing and in-person is more effective and only budgets 20% to social media.

The balance is yours to discover! 

We’d love to help you find that balance — click here to send us a message.