You’ve developed your brand identity, defined your target audience and established SMART goals for your nonprofit.

Now, it’s time to focus on your marketing strategy and tactics.

Those terms are sometimes used interchangeably even though they’re separate components of a marketing plan. Both can help you achieve success, but the distinction lies in their scope.

The Difference Between Strategies and Tactics?

A goal is an end result you want to achieve. For instance, “raise revenue by 10% next year.”

Strategies are the steps you develop to achieve each goal. A strategy for the goal above might be “drive 25% more targeted traffic to our e-commerce website.”

Tactics are the tools you use to accomplish each strategy. A tactic to support the strategy above could be  “create a content calendar that makes it easier to publish keyword-rich articles that will boost our website’s presence in search engines.”

Types of Nonprofit Marketing Strategies

Consider the steps you will need to reach the goals you’ve set for your nonprofit. Your strategy serves as your roadmap.

Answer the following questions to define your nonprofit marketing strategies:

• What are the pain points of your target audience?
• How does your nonprofit address those pains?
• What sets you apart from other charitable organizations that serve a similar purpose or audience?
• What resources do offer to serve those in need?
• Can you align your budget, staffing and timeline to obtain your goal?

Developing strategies allows you to clarify your purpose and optimize your efforts and resources.

Here are some examples of marketing strategies:

Digital marketing: This strategy uses online tools and platforms to increase web traffic, raise awareness, boost engagement and monitor donor activity.

Content marketing: Creating and distributing relevant content to your donors, volunteers and beneficiaries allows you to connect with your audience. Content includes blog posts, emails, videos, infographics and images.

Search engine optimization: Optimizing your website to improve its ranking on search results pages puts your brand in front of more people who are searching for terms associated with your nonprofit. That includes using relevant keywords and structuring website data for users and web crawlers.

Email marketing: Use email marketing to engage existing and potential donors and volunteers. Email campaigns are good for welcoming new subscribers, sharing updates and highlighting success stories.

Social media marketing: Showcase your nonprofit and raise awareness for your cause by sharing insight and updates on social media. Leverage different platforms to connect with specific segments of your target audience, answer questions and direct users to your website.

Advertising: Create targeted ads for social media, print channels and Google searches to bring attention to your initiatives and fundraisers.

Types of Nonprofit Marketing Tactics

Once you’ve defined your goals, brainstorm steps to execute your strategy. Marketing tactics are actionable items that allow you to deliver on your promise to your beneficiaries, donors and volunteers.

Here’s an example:

A nonprofit organization focused on ending childhood hunger has monthly food drives and wants to raise funds and increase donations. They’ll use content and social media marketing to engage current and potential donors.

Tactics for content marketing:

• Produce a series of video testimonials featuring families who’ve benefited from the food drives.
• Write a monthly blog article to educate readers on aspects of childhood hunger.
• Send a quarterly email newsletter to subscribers recapping past initiatives and discussing upcoming events.
• Publish an annual report to showcase your achievements and future plans.

Tactics for social media marketing:

• Write and share regular updates on your social channels about upcoming food drive locations, times and in-demand items.
• Share blog posts and testimonial videos on social media to emphasize the impact your nonprofit made on childhood hunger.
• Use Facebook fundraisers to provide donors with an alternative to donating food.
• Use Instagram Stories and Reels to update your followers on donation progress during the monthly food drive.

We’ll complete our series on nonprofit marketing plan development with budget and content calendar creation and implementation.

The MadAveCollective team is committed to providing your nonprofit organization with the tools you need to spread awareness and serve others. Call 419-725-6500 or send an email to start a conversation.