090 – Avoid These Mistakes Non-Profits Make on Social Media with Keigan Carthy

Episode Transcription

David Pisarek: This podcast episode is made possible by wowdigital.com, your trusted partner for non-profit and charity website and design.

Looking for ways to engage and retain donors in the long term using digital strategies? Do you want to know how a successful digital campaign can raise awareness and influence policy about public perception? Stay with us and discover how.

Welcome to the Non-Profit Digital Success podcast. I’m your host, David, and we are going to discuss everything about modern social media in this episode.

We’re going to see if we can jam it into 20 minutes here. I have a subject matter expert with me, the amazing Keigan Carthy. Keigan is a founder of Vision Management, a marketing firm specializing in B2B and non-profit digital marketing.

Some of his accomplishments are helping Invisible People win a Streamy, along with other awards, helping drive donations for his non-profit clients and working with household names in the B2B space. Keigan, thank you so much for joining on the show today. How are you today?

Keigan Carthy: I’m good, thank you. I appreciate you having me on.

David Pisarek: Absolutely. I can’t wait to jump in on this. I hope people listening to this are going to stay to the end because you’ve got a little bit of an offer that we’ll talk about on the back end of this. But let’s just jump in here.

I think people know what social media is, but when we think about non-profits in the space, are there any myths that you would like to debunk about non-profits, maybe from a digital marketing perspective?

Keigan Carthy:

Not necessarily miss, but the mistake that they make is they’re putting out content that they want to put out, not that the audience wants to consume.

We work with invisible people. I mean, anybody in the non-profit space should have an idea of who they are, especially for homelessness. The content that they put out, it’s raw, it’s authentic, it’s what the viewers actually want to see. It’s not corporate reels or slideshows or anything like that.

That content is stuff that actually influences change and you can see that with them winning the streamy, that’s a big deal, especially in the online space.

We work with the chapter of Habitat for Humanity, and they’ve turned into more of the flagship chapter, especially for social media and same thing, we’ve helped them create the content that people actually want to see that’s actually going to drive volunteering donations, etc.

David Pisarek: If somebody was listening to this… You know what? We’re doing stuff on social. I talk about often enough that anybody listening to this would probably recall.

You need to look at your analytics. How are people landing on your website? What are those keywords that they’re searching for? That’s going to give you a really clear indication as to what questions, FAQs, things that you can talk about that might resonate with people outside of your world.

Because let’s face it, when we’re in an organization, we really think inwardly about ourselves versus thinking about “Who do we want to connect with and what are they thinking about?”- Is there any quick tips that somebody listening to this could do to help them with that?

Keigan Carthy: First of all, going to the keyword thing, super easy to use. I mean, even if it’s Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager and everything like that’s too complicated for people to implement, it’s as simple as using a free SEO tool like Semrush or Ahrefs, whatever.

You just search in non-profits and you just go down the rabbit hole, tell you the keyword traffic and blah, blah, blah. Takes 5-10 minutes. And then you have a plethora of content ideas that people will actually want to consume.

David Pisarek: I think there’s going to be a lot of free tools that we’re talking about and maybe some paid tools. So head over to our show notes page at nonprofitdigitalsuccess.com and click on this episode for the details and you’ll get links and all that cool stuff that Keigan and I are talking about.

So we talked about keywords. If you don’t know what a keyword is, you can listen to some other episodes, or you can just go to Google and type in what is a keyword, and you’ll get instant result right there for you to understand what is an actual keywords.

When we think about digital tools like the ones you just mentioned and innovation, what can we do to enhance a non-profit’s mission?

Keigan Carthy: Honestly, I want to stay in the theme of content. With the tools. It’s nothing, nothing matters really that much because at the end of the day, as a marketer, you want to pour gas on a fire that’s already there. You don’t want to create one.

So at the end of the day, it comes back to the content that you’re putting out. That’s just all the tools you can have, the best tools, the best AI, whatever. But if your content sucks and people aren’t seeing it, then nothing’s going to matter.

David Pisarek: So how often should somebody publish content?

Keigan Carthy: It’s one of those things.

It’s like, “Do you want to post five to seven times a week, or do you want to post one to two times a week of actually good thought-provoking content that people are going to see?” It’s finding that balance.

With Habitats for Humanity as an example, they have a team that’s out in the field. They’re interviewing homeowners on the site. They’re doing a bunch of different video, but it’s for some of the other clients, they can’t really be in the field 24/7. So it’s like, “Okay, let’s just post one to three times a week of the interviews, the good stuff, rather than just spewing out garbage (we’ll say) just for the sake of posting.”

David Pisarek: Are we talking about on social media channels or on your website, blog articles, that type of thing?

Keigan Carthy: So at least what we do in regards to the blog, we just repurpose social video into blog posts that way.

So again, it’s like social and blogs are a little bit different. I can’t speak too much on the blog side of things because that’s not what we focus on. But at least I assume that it’s the same thing where it’s like if you’re going to read or if you’re going to watch, the content has to be good in the first place.

David Pisarek: Yeah. So on the wall behind me over here, if you’re watching this episode, this is not a virtual background. This is all real.

We do content calendering and stuff for our clients in terms of blogs and that type of stuff. So if you’re interested in that, just get in touch.

Content is king; that’s the old adage; the algorithms prove this.

The more frequently you post content, the more you’re going to rank higher based on the algorithm.

If you can afford to spend five minutes a day, maybe in the morning and afternoon, you can see trends as to how people are interacting with your content.

For example, if you’re on social, if people are interacting more in the afternoon, well, maybe you give up doing anything in the morning. You post twice in the afternoon instead of something in the morning.

I think it’s important to keep some metrics, develop some KPIs, some ways that you can easily keep track of what you’re doing so that you can know what you should be doing more of or less of.

Keigan Carthy: 100%. I mean, the KPIs because we have an organic and paid strategy for some of our clients that we focus on.

Organic is a little bit more difficult to see your KPIs because at the end of the day, you’re at the mercy of the algorithm. But at least on the paid side, it’s a lot easier to build those metrics and KPIs because you’re guaranteed results depending on your spend. At least you’re in the ballpark, at least.

On the paid side for non-profits (because obviously there is a limited budget compared to the B2B corporate space), we use a simple dollar-a-day strategy when we can post a lot throughout the week.

So with Habitat for Humanities, Central Arizona, we do $1 a day to $5 a day, post five to six times a week, short-form video, super simple. And the KPIs that we’re looking for is we’re more looking for engagement rather than the actual conversions, because at the end of the day, non-profits, it’s on the back of everybody’s mind.

Unless you’re around Christmas or a giving season, but we wanted to generate that brand awareness and get in front of people as much as we can.

So just simple ad buys that are super cheap that can fit in anybody’s budget and then look for a high engagement rate, that’s the best KPI that you can have.

David Pisarek: What do you actually get for one to $5 a day?

Keigan Carthy: Obviously, Arizona is a big state. I’m from Canada, so I can’t tell you the exact population size. But you’re getting with the targeting features, you can get in front of people that are more likely that are going to click on your website, that are going to volunteer, etcetera.

You’re guaranteed 1,000 to 3,000 video views depending on the platform. Obviously, Meta, TikTok, YouTube are completely different, but you’re in front of the exact same people over and over and over again. That plays in the marketing psychology.

I was looking at the Google Analytics over the past 90 days, we’ve basically 100X the website conversions around Christmas time just because the work that we’ve been doing in the past.

Now, if it’s Christmas, we could ramp up the ad spend, really get in front of people, and now the donations are flowing in.

David Pisarek: I think that’s really great, bearing in mind different budgets. If you can afford $7 a week or even $5 a week, just want Monday to Friday, I would potentially argue that maybe if you’re a non-profit spending a bit more money on ads, if you can control time of day, be in the evening or on weekends when people are not busy at work all day. What are your thoughts around that?

Keigan Carthy: So the ads, regardless of the time frame, they’re running all the time.

So it doesn’t really matter too much, at least we’ve seen on the day, especially if you’re doing only a dollar buy, it’s going to get in front people no matter what. So time of day really isn’t the biggest thing.

David Pisarek: When we’re talking about impactful data, what can we do to showcase a non-profit’s achievements online?

Keigan Carthy: Interesting. So impactful data, that’s when you’re looking at the analytics behind the scenes.

So what we do, going to say on the paid side, no matter what industry, what vertical you’re in, it’s the first thing that you need to do before you even think about running ads, posting content, implementing Google Analytics on your website. That is the foundation for everything.

If you’re running ads, the social media pixels are everything. Then, you need to understand what your goal is that you’re trying to achieve through social media. Is that brand awareness? Is it donations, etcetera, etcetera? And it goes into the content.

What content do you have? What can you create, etcetera? And you look at the targeting. What does the ideal donor look like? The ideal volunteer, etcetera.

We call that GCT: Goals, Content, Targeting. That’s the biggest framework that will create your success.

And then from there, it’s just as simple as the process that you followed below. It’s a checklist, “Okay, what’s the goal with you posting your success? What’s the content look like? What’s the targeting look like?”

David Pisarek: That is really great. What was that acronym again? GCT?

Keigan Carthy: Yeah. Goals, Content, Target.

David Pisarek: Love that. Anybody listening to this, write it down on a post it, stick it on the bottom of your monitor.

This should affect what you do throughout your entire digital spectrum of marketing, your website to your social posts, to your job postings, to everything.

How are you going to connect with them and what’s the end goal there? In terms of digital strategy, long-term donor engagement and support, I think it’s really hard to get somebody to actually donate to your organization, especially if you’re maybe not a big organization like Habitat for Humanity, where probably a lot of people have heard about you.

It typically takes seven to eight interactions for no like and trust factors.

Getting in front of people on a regular basis, consistent basis, not always asking for money, I think is really key. Talking about the impact that you’re having, who you’re helping with the funds, I think that’s also really key.

What would you say your digital strategy would be for fostering long-term donor engagement?

Keigan Carthy:

We need to get an emotional reaction out of the viewers, first and foremost.

I’m going to go back to Invisible People here because this is the easiest example. Their content is emotional, plain and simple. That’s what’s actually going to let a fire under people.

At the end of the day, for actual donations for people wanting to influence change. You can walk through the mall, you might stop at the Salvation Army. They have the people there, they offer donations you might throw a dollar or two. Great. That’s not long-term. That doesn’t get an emotional reaction.

Watching raw, authentic video of people homeless on the street, sharing their stories and their experiences, what they go through, that’s going to get an emotional reaction. That’s what’s going to get you committed long-term or provide a bigger donation to actually influence change.

David Pisarek: Have you been able actually to affect policy through the work that you’re doing?

Keigan Carthy: That I can’t talk too much about, sadly, just because NDA is involved. What I can touch on is people are getting basically pissed off and they’re then going to their local government to then influence change from there.

So if you want to actually influence policy, like I said, you need to create an emotional connection and either get people sad or get people pissed off because those are the most strongest emotions for people to have to actually go and do something.

David Pisarek: You want to pull their heartstrings. Ideally, as a non-profit, you need money coming in so that you can continue to pay your staff or buy supplies or do whatever it is that your organization’s mission is.

You want to create change. You want to get people to actually interact with you in a way that ultimately will lead to donation coming in. If you can affect somebody that they are so moved, I guess, by what it is that you’re talking about, either on the positive or the negative side, they will go and they will start to petition or send emails or letters or whatever to their local governments or provincial or state or national federal governments.

So I think that’s really key. If you can get out there and really push your message and be like, “This is a big problem we need to solve, you’re going to end up getting supporters rallying behind.”

Keigan Carthy: 100%

David Pisarek: So in terms of non-profit staff, executives, digital contractors like you and I, what are some of these challenges that you’ve seen and how can you address them?

Keigan Carthy: The biggest thing, it just comes down to lack of budget in the first place, especially for a lot of the smaller non-profits where they rely a lot on volunteers.

That comes a lot on the marketing side. Usually the CMO or the director, whoever in charge of that, forces them to wear a lot of hats at the end of the day. But it’s a misconception that marketing agencies are expensive.

I mean, in some capacities, we are. But a lot of times, especially in the non-profit space, I don’t know about you, but for us personally, we’re willing to take a cut to help out in any way that we can.

Also, a lot of with the executives, they don’t really like to ask for help or reach out in the first place. Even free offers, like a website on it or something like that, they just stay away from it. Just rather wear all the hats, do it themselves. Easiest way to address it’s like anything in life, just ask because you don’t know what the answer is.

Just ask somebody for help and see what happens. That’s the easiest way to address that, especially if you’re low budget.

David Pisarek: Yeah. I mean, if you don’t have a lot of funds in your organization, hiring an outside firm like yours or mine, you’re getting hundreds of thousands of dollars of staff for very, very minimal cost.

And you’re going to basically cut through any barriers that exist in terms of knowledge base because you’re hiring the experts to deal with whatever that thing is that you need the support with.

To Keigan’s point, we’re here to help. We want to be change-makers with you. We want to partner with you and help you do more good in the world.

You should definitely reach out, whether it’s one of us. I mean, you should totally hire one of us. But whoever you’re connecting with, leverage them and have them help you. They’re there for a specific reason to support you with X, Y, and Z.

Keigan Carthy: Exactly.

David Pisarek: Keigan, some amazing thoughts today all around social media and strategy and some data. I hope people listening to the episode have gotten something really, really great from the conversation today.

And what I’d love for you to do is to challenge everybody listening to this episode, what is something that you want them to do in the next 24 to 48 hours after listening to this?

Keigan Carthy: Go make some actually good content that your viewers are going to want to watch.

David Pisarek: There you go. Go make a little bit of content and put it out there.

Everybody’s got a phone or two or three or tablets or webcams in your laptops, computers. So go and get it. If you don’t have a camera, hop on Amazon. Whether you like Amazon or not, you can get cameras for like $30, $20.

Just get out there, put your message out there. Keep moving forward. If anybody wants to get in touch with you, Keigan, what do they need to do?

Keigan Carthy: You can look in the show notes for my social links. Visit our website, visionmanagement.co

David Pisarek: Amazing. And before the show we were talking about, you’ve got a little free gift for people that have made it all the way through to this point in episode. So tell us, what’s that about?

Keigan Carthy: So in the show notes, we have a Calendly link for you to book a call with me personally. We’ll sit down for 30 to 45 minutes. We’ll do a full social media audit, everything from Google Analytics to your page, to your content, etc.

David Pisarek: Fantastic. It doesn’t get better than that. A free social media audit. You’re probably going to walk out of that with some really great ideas. I highly recommend Keigan for all of you.

Keigan, thank you so much for joining in. And it’s been great having you on the Non-Profit Digital Success podcast here with me.

And to everybody listening, if you want any of the links or the resources or the Calendly link or the website link, head over to our show notes page at nonprofitdigitalsuccess.com click on this episode for all the details. And until next time, keep on being successful.