Missions to Movements
This isn't just another nonprofit podcast - it's your weekly invitation to think bigger, take bold risks, and create lasting change in an ever-evolving social impact landscape. Meet Dana Snyder, your guide through the evolving landscape of nonprofit innovation. She's on a mission to help change-makers like you push the boundaries of what's possible in nonprofit marketing and fundraising. Each week, Missions to Movements serves as your personal mastermind session, delivering actionable insights and bold strategies that challenge traditional nonprofit thinking. Dive into revolutionary approaches to digital fundraising, discover how to build magnetic monthly giving programs that create lasting donor relationships, and learn to amplify your voice as a thought leader in the social good space. Whether you're reimagining your organization's impact or forging game-changing partnerships, you'll find the ideas, insights, and inspiration to take your mission further than you've ever imagined. Ready to turn your mission into a movement?
Missions to Movements
Becoming a Social Fundraiser: How to Build Donor Relationships on LinkedIn with Microsoft's Carson Heady
What if your next major donor or corporate partner is already in your LinkedIn inbox, and all you need is the right message to start the conversation?
Carson Heady is someone who's truly mastered the art of showing up online with purpose. He's a five times best selling author, podcast host, and one of the most insightful voices on social leadership. As the Managing Director at Microsoft Tech for Social Impact, Carson is here to share how nonprofit professionals can borrow proven strategies from the sales world to build genuine relationships, increase visibility, and spark fundraising opportunities - ALL through LinkedIn.
Thoughtful DMs are outperforming long emails!
You’ll learn how to send better connection requests, strategies for leveraging Sales Navigator for donor prospecting, and how to use the platform as a relationship engine rather than just a digital resume.
You’ll also hear how Carson personally raised $80,000 for a nonprofit through a targeted LinkedIn campaign and why he believes nonprofit leaders should embrace the title of "social fundraiser."
Resources & Links
Connect with Carson on LinkedIn and check out his podcast, Mastering Modern Selling. He also published a great article on LinkedIn, How I Became the #1 Social Seller in Tech - and How You Can Too.
Carson recommends Opus as his favorite AI video clipping tool.
This show is presented by LinkedIn for Nonprofits. We’re so grateful for their partnership. Explore their incredible suite of resources and discounts for nonprofit teams here, including up to 50% off LinkedIn hiring tools.
My book, The Monthly Giving Mastermind, is here! Grab a copy here and learn my framework to build, grow, and sustain subscriptions for good.
Let's Connect!
- Send a DM on Instagram or LinkedIn and let us know what you think of the show!
- Head to YouTube for digital marketing how-to videos and podcast teasers
- Want to book Dana as a speaker for your event? Click here!
Welcome back to Missions, to Movements. I'm your host, Dana Snyder, and today's episode is all about unlocking the power of LinkedIn, Not just for connections, but for genuine conversions and conversations that move your mission forward. Now today's guest is someone who's truly mastered the art of showing up online with purpose. Carson Heady is the America's Managing Director for Microsoft Tech for Social Impact, where he helps nonprofits leverage technology, innovation and storytelling to scale their impact. He's been featured in the Wall Street Journal Forbes.
Speaker 1:He's a five times bestselling author, a podcast host and one of the most insightful voices on social leadership in the sector. He also happens to be known as the number one social seller in tech, and after today's episode, he might just convince you that you can become the number one social fundraiser Now. In fact, that idea and title hit me mid-conversation, because Carson's approach to social selling is so aligned with how we should be thinking about building trust, starting conversations and inspiring action in the nonprofit world. So, yes, I'm officially embracing the title of a social fundraiser, and I hope you will join me in that. So today we talk all things LinkedIn how to use it for thought leadership, how to build relationships that lead to funding, and how to use tools like Sales Navigator to connect you with mission-aligned partners without it ever feeling transactional. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2:Don't oversell it or overdo it. I think too. Sometimes I'm one of those people. I used to write very long stream of consciousness emails like throw in the kitchen sink and then pat myself on the back because I thought it sounded really articulate. But the reality is people have a lot going on. There's a lot of noise in the world. Keep it to two to three sentences. Try to earn the conversation. Make it personal, explain why it matters to you, but then also explain why there could be value for the recipient and your probability of getting that conversation go way up.
Speaker 1:Carson, when I was looking at your LinkedIn account I was a little bit like nearly 48,000 LinkedIn followers. You have built an extremely strong presence on the platform as a thought leader on LinkedIn so much so we were talking about beforehand. Linkedin asked you to do this interview with me when I was asking them for who's a really good thought leader on the platform, who can really talk about this to my audience and really break down some of the tools. What originally really sparked your decision to be active on the platform and show up? And then how has that showing up on the platform? Obviously, you didn't start with 48,000 followers when you began. How has that really impacted your career?
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, dana, thanks so much for having me. I'm honored. Thank you for what you do for nonprofits that we mutually serve, and always grateful for the collaboration with LinkedIn as well. When it started for me, it was years ago and it was very serendipitous. I've been very fortunate not only with my leveraging of the platform, but also just kind of where it's taken me, you know, from a career, but mostly a relationships perspective, because I think that's where it really is at the heart.
Speaker 2:So when I first started leveraging LinkedIn, it was years ago and, ironically or not, shortly after I was laid off from a job a corporate job, back in 2010, but also as I had written a book and my publisher started telling me leveraging social will help you.
Speaker 2:And then I also started working for a small consultant firm, and the primary charter of that was developing C-level relationships, and so I thought to myself these folks that I want to connect with are on LinkedIn, so by doing so, it will give me a higher viability or probability of having the types of connections that I want to have, and I've always tried to focus on the next right step.
Speaker 2:So getting a conversation has been critical, and so for everything that I've been in since then, whether it's been in different sales or leadership roles, having relationships and doing meaningful connection via LinkedIn has been super impactful. You asked also about just the impact on my career as a whole. One of the things that I had to do years ago was just be very intentional about how I could leverage the platform in a way to express my experiences, my perspectives. I tell everybody that I coach and train globally on this that you know, hey, your perspective matters Whether you're brand new in your career or you're 20, 30 years in. What you have to say will resonate and matters to a group of people that are either going through what you're experiencing or what you have experienced, so I took that to heart.
Speaker 2:It was about progress over perfect for me, and I just started speaking to the audience in a way that would hopefully start conversations, and thankfully it did.
Speaker 1:This is one of those very serendipitous moments. In the past 30 seconds, you have said two things that I say almost exactly during one of my keynotes. I love that. Wow, then for us to meet literally the progress over perfection and the fact that showing up in your messy middle regardless if you are just starting your career or ready to give consulting advice that it's all applicable to the platform. And something that I want to dive into that I think is really interesting listeners, is the fact that, carson, you just said you are connecting with C-suite level people on the platform to build relationships. Now I want to.
Speaker 1:This is a very detailed kind of nitty gritty question, but the connection request when you are connecting with people at a C-suite because I'm picturing this leader that's listening right now you're trying to reach out to a C-suite at a potential company that you want to do a partnership with. You're trying to reach out to a potential donor that could be an affluent business professional on the platform. So this is context right, would you just connect? Did you write a message in the connection? Can you kind of walk through what was your process? I'm sure, because you've done this now for years what works?
Speaker 2:I've evolved my practice in many, many ways to put the people that I'm trying to connect with at the heart of my process. That said, I always send a message along with the connection. Some people will say don't send a message with the connection? Some people will say, do I always do, and here's why? Because here's the thing. What are you ultimately trying to do? Granted, you might want that person. If you're at a nonprofit organization, you may want that person to be a donor. You may want that person to be a volunteer. You may want that person to engage with you in some meaningful way, but you can't also put the cart before the horse. None of that happens unless you start a conversation, and I always have to think very intentionally about what is the unique value differentiator that I can present to this person.
Speaker 2:Now, a lot of my outreach in the last 11 years since I've been at Microsoft has been based on being a part of their Microsoft leadership team, and the biggest challenge that Microsoft sellers have is that typically, we fall into just IT and procurement, and while those relationships are of critical importance, we're not going to have meaningful transformation unless we also engage the C-level, the board, chief data, chief strategy, chief security CFO, etc. So my point in saying all that is it's not lost on me that our customers have a lot of choices. Why would they want to have a conversation with me? Well, first off, I'm part of their leadership account team. I know that they have opportunities and options and a lot of times customers see us as we pay you a lot of money, we don't want to just buy more. And where I think salespeople go wrong is they mention widgets and products and names of solutions. The reality is people view any change as a risk.
Speaker 2:And so if I reach out and I always reach out saying hey, I want to talk to you about resources that you're entitled to as part of your existing investment, the likelihood of me getting the meeting is very, very high. And, believe me, there are conversations where I engage and I don't see a path forward and I will say that like, hey, it sounds like you're good, you're optimized, you're doing everything.
Speaker 2:Hey, congratulations please, I'm available, I'm here, but there are oftentimes where I'll come into situations and it's there are challenges that they're struggling with, or there are goals that they have, or it's a new executive and I asked them like what legacy do you want to leave with this organization? Why did you join this organization?
Speaker 1:How can I?
Speaker 2:be able to demystify the investments that they make with my company. How can I empower and enable that to happen? So my long story, short to sum up, dana, is I think the key element is yes, I always send a connection request message and it's very much geared toward the value that I believe that I can bring. Let's be real the value that a lot of nonprofits can bring is far superior to what I can bring as a sales leader. Often it is going to be more of life-changing or where we can influence research together or where we need to even bring a serious amount of fulfillment for the person that receives that connection request. So I think you've got to think very intentionally about what's the value that I bring and my organization brings, and that's got to be in your introduction as you try to earn that meeting.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And then, naturally, what I do when I see that connection is a lot of times I go to the profile and I see what have they posted about recently outside of just like the job title that they have. So if listeners are just working on building up that profile, that presence, because that's really important, if somebody's going to say yes or no to this connection, like, is this a relevant relationship that I want to establish, what is a good starting point for positioning them as a trusted source and voice on LinkedIn?
Speaker 2:Amazing question. Everyone has their unique perspective, but you also have your preferred or viable mediums, and what I mean by that is like, for instance, when I started years ago, I was creating and posting content. I got out on several sites. My publisher at the time was like open a Twitter, open a Facebook for business or whatever the case may be.
Speaker 2:Think about where your audience is and where it's most viable to meet them where they are. I love LinkedIn because a lot of the relationships that I'm trying to create are business professionals and that's where they likely sit. I also have a lot of followers on Twitter over 250,000. That's where I've sold a preponderance of my books, actually. But thinking about the different ways that you can touch your audience and what's amazing too, dana, like I think about this I became, I would say, a reluctant or accidental podcast host about five years ago. I have a show called Mastering Modern Selling with two of my colleagues and what's amazing is like it all started in the pandemic, where I was thinking to myself you know, I really miss talking around and sitting around talking about sales and company culture and leadership and then I realized I could do that with anybody at any time in the world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you and the guys at SmartList had the same idea.
Speaker 2:There you go, there you go. I love that. You know it's like it's funny that we have this ability that we can talk to anybody at any time, and I think, nonprofit leaders like out there everywhere. You're empowered and enabled right now to go out and create this perspective and, you know, create a short video or a podcast, or you know, write a blog or creating content on multiple sites and meeting your audience where they are. There's no silver bullet, and I think that's what I've really realized.
Speaker 2:Linkedin is a great area of collaboration, but there's others as well, and even the leverage how you can leverage LinkedIn to become a thought leader. These things are of critical importance. But you know what's amazing too, dana, I go to conferences and conventions a lot and I'll have people come up to me and say, you know, I'm planning a you know kind of a LinkedIn strategy and I'm going to go out in a couple of weeks and start this and I'm like, why not today? You know, because, again, going back to that, progress over perfect, I likely and, to be very candid, a lot of the posts and the articles that I write, the things that I have to tell myself or remind myself, are things that I might've learned the hard way.
Speaker 2:Think about the depth of wisdom and knowledge that you've accumulated at this stage of your life and career and just try to start a conversation that's it with your ideal candidate. You know, sharing experiences that you're having. I mean there are a lot of fulfilling and rewarding experiences that you can have as a nonprofit and as a nonprofit leader. I think of some of the executives that I work with in the nonprofit space and some that are very prolific and some that are very inspiring. There's one that travels to locations that are within prolific and some that are very inspiring. There's one that travels to locations that are within their jurisdiction and post a video of them at every one of these locations. Out changing the world and just having that video out there and posting how important their mission is to them. That is powerful. And not only that, but that ability for them to do that caught my attention and it helped me parlay that into me getting them on stage at a summit 2,000 nonprofits earlier in the year.
Speaker 2:So my point is you never know where these investments are going to go. Heck. I had an article that I wrote 10 years ago. Dana, just get picked up by the Wall Street Journal. They reached out to me, wanted to interview me. I was in an issue earlier this year. My point in saying all this is you get to choose where you make deposits in your time, your energy, your relationships, and I strongly encourage you to make deposits into starting conversations on social platforms globally, where your audience is. It will pay dividends.
Speaker 1:I love that and I love the example you shared about a couple of different examples of posting something here therefore gave me the idea of an event that I have and wanting to put you on stage there, and I think there's nothing more beautiful than being able to be in person in real life with people, and so that digital asset then turned into a real life experience and it's interesting. So before we started recording I was telling you about I was on a local CBS affiliate this morning talking about monthly giving, which is all about what I teach, and on LinkedIn I shared afterwards not just about the segment that I was talking about Recurrent Giving. Linkedin I shared afterwards, not just about the segment and that I was talking about recurrent giving. Cool, but it was really interesting. There happened to be a segment right before me, so in their set there was like three different set areas and the hosts are magicians where they literally are like walking between sets as they're talking and there's something on the screen for B-roll. And the woman right before me was a financial advisor and she was talking all about summer spending and how you can be more budget conscious.
Speaker 1:Now, I did not know anything about what she was going to say. But I was like, oh my gosh, this is literally perfect. I'm talking about monthly giving and how it's easier on your wallet and you can still give to the organizations that you care about. And so I tied those things together in my segment. I had no idea her name was Abby, that she was going to be there, that she was going to say that it tied perfectly.
Speaker 1:So in my LinkedIn post I talked about capturing the moments of relevancy, of where you are and being able to think quickly on your feet for an instance like that, to tie things together and always be prepared to tell your story and how it can integrate. So the LinkedIn post was a video of credibility Obviously it's me on a news set but then also a teaching moment of the kind of a behind the scenes experience of what I was experiencing. So I think we sometimes think I have to have it all kind of your point figured out and it's at the end, but no, it's just like in the moment this happened. I'm going to share kind of a behind the scenes moment of it. Where do you really see for nonprofit professionals and you gave that one brilliant example when do you see LinkedIn content that can help with building, attracting donors and specifically, maybe corporate partners too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's an awesome question, I think, when you think about it again, I always boil it down to the relationships and I think about what are the relationships that I'm gonna want or need to create in order to cultivate the desired outcome. And so when I'm thinking about donors or when I'm thinking about corporate sponsorships and partnerships and again I always start with my existing network I think about things from a probability and viability standpoint. So I think about you know who are some of the existing relationships that I have, and you know what's the messaging that could conceivably get me that meeting to discuss. You know how do I make it about them as well.
Speaker 2:You know there's so many benefits now to you know, to finding significant space for giving, and I was able to find and secure some partnership dollars recently because we're coming up on the end of our fiscal year and it's all about timeliness and meeting somebody at the right time. Just because maybe they didn't talk to you last year when you tried the attempt doesn't mean that the planets won't align this time, because you never know when and how the message will reach them. And so the other thing I'd be remiss not to add is that there's two things that I really double down on right now because they help me so much, because we're in such a digital age lean into that. Look, I've been doing this a long time. I have to really stay ahead of the curve.
Speaker 2:You know be even more valuable or invaluable in this space because, a lot is enabled by technology and artificial intelligence, and so the ability to leverage things like Sales Navigator to create a very cultivated feed of the people that I want to engage with, based on geography or title or seniority or whatever the case may be, and, on the flip side, the ability to leverage AI to help me write prompts when I might get stuck, those types of things help me. So if I can post a prompt or write a prompt of you know, help me write two to three sentences, that will help me earn a meeting with someone to talk about corporate sponsorship possibilities. Those types of things help me tremendously because sometimes, you know, believe it or not, I fumble for words regularly, especially with my wife.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, especially with my wife, just ask her. But I think the key element is like finding the right way to ask the question so that because, again, don't put the cart before the horse You're just trying to have an exploratory meeting and, frankly, they may also be able to introduce you to others that could help you on that pursuit. So lean into the technology, look for ways that you can help find the right people, but also finding the right way of wording what you're looking to do. I recently did a campaign for a very prominent nonprofit. I leveraged LinkedIn, I leveraged messaging with LinkedIn and in fact, last year I generated over $80,000 for a nonprofit that's near and dear to my heart through the exact same campaign style, just by leveraging LinkedIn, sending a couple of sentences telling it why it mattered to me, why it was personal, but also outlining the opportunity and offering to have a conversation, and so I think the key is don't oversell it or overdo it.
Speaker 2:I think too, sometimes, like I'm one of those people. I used to write very long stream of consciousness emails, like you know, throw in the kitchen sink and then pat myself on the back because I thought it sounded really articulate. But the reality is people have a lot going on.
Speaker 3:There's a lot of noise in the world.
Speaker 2:Keep it to two to three sentences. Try to earn the conversation. Make it personal, explain why it matters to you, but then also explain why there could be value for the recipient and your probability of getting that conversation go way up.
Speaker 1:So good. You wrote a great article and I know it was structured in the sales vein, but for nonprofit listeners I will link to it in the show notes. It just came out at the end of May how I became the number one social seller, which I love social seller. How can you become the number one social fundraiser yeah, the number one social fundraiser in tech, and how you can too. And all of your tips in here are spot on and can be done in the nonprofit space too. And what you just talked about is creating value and really investing in them.
Speaker 1:First, building genuine connections, and so I think that's really important. There's so much power. I always say in the DMs, in the direct messages that take place. I have booked so many podcast guests. A lot of my monthly giving summit speakers are through LinkedIn messages. You have no idea the power that's in them, especially because they become a push notification to your phone over sometimes, where emails get lost. So they are also way more visible to you as an individual and you can see that. So I love that, keeping it short and sweet and really thinking about the connection point.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you brought up LinkedIn Sales Navigator and there's a couple questions I have on this. Traditionally, it's been viewed as a B2B sales tool. Just two months ago, gosh, I can't believe April has been two months ago. You're telling me LinkedIn for nonprofits provided I think it was for 2,000 nonprofits six months free of Sales Navigator. So I hope you're one of the nonprofits that got that. There's so much potential to use it to create fundraising pipelines For an organization that might be just be starting. Maybe they got that six months. They're on month Beginning of month two. What filters, what strategies, what habits would you recommend they put into place to use Sales Navigator to its fullest potential?
Speaker 2:I love this topic, dana. I've sat down with multiple CEOs and chief marketing officers at nonprofits just even over the last six months and started the dialogue but then also seen it through of different ways that organizations can leverage LinkedIn Sales Navigator. Of different ways that organizations can leverage LinkedIn Sales Navigator Whether you're recruiting, looking to fill roles, looking to fill board spots, whether you're looking for fundraisers, whether you're looking for volunteers. There's so many practical use cases. I was sitting down with a very prominent CEO recently and this is an area where we're helping them. We're embarking on a project because here's the thing I work for Microsoft Customers can buy cloud anywhere. The differentiator is going to be where can I and my company uniquely help them as opposed to our competition? And I think we're uniquely poised because of how we show up and how we invest in nonprofits. But it's also incumbent upon me to evangelize that and really help them see like unique ways that we can partner and collaborate. And one of the biggest challenges that a lot of organizations have had in finding volunteers post pandemic is, you know, for instance, this particular one was sending volunteers into schools, and what we were looking at is when it was possible for these business professionals to pop on online. Those are easy for them. They could do that from anywhere, but they were wanting to get back into sending physical people into physical locations and so it was becoming more challenging. Their volunteerism was down. So where we're helping this organization is looking at, okay, the type of you know the mold, the model of that volunteer is out on LinkedIn. Let's find the geography, let's cast a wide net, let's create a messaging or an outreach campaign via in-mail or direct message that can go directly to some of these folks. And again, it's a probability game. But if you reach out with the right message and I'm a business professional, somebody if a nonprofit reached out to me and asked me to go into a school once a month or once a quarter, I'd say absolutely yes, sign me up, please sign me up, yeah, yeah, you know, coming from a place of, I'm not inconveniencing anyone and I can go out and I can find someone who fits the exact profile geography, wise, professional, wise, years of experience, you know, being able to find by title, you can literally find whatever you're looking for. And so let's say I'm a nonprofit and I want to connect with the school or I want to connect with some other organizations that I seek to serve and I want to send the perfect volunteer their way. It just gives me a much larger sea in which to fish, and so I think that's the key element is it really comes down to being able to find that perfect model?
Speaker 2:Furthermore, filtering the filtering. And then, same token, dana on you know we were talking about this in the green room before we hopped on. Think about, like finding a board member. You can find very similar. You know, I want to find maybe somebody who's been on other nonprofit boards, or I work in healthcare or I work in mental health, and I want to find somebody who has this passion area or these key words that are on their profile. Sales navigator will do all that for you. And lastly, same thing from a recruiting perspective. You can go out and find very specific people that have done titles or jobs before, but they may have interests or affiliation with nonprofits on their profile.
Speaker 2:All of these things can be found through Sales Navigator, and that is why it is invaluable. I use it literally every day. The last thing I will mention on this is we were talking about this too before we hopped on the ability that you have to even take Excel documents and put it in of like target organizations or target people that you want to reach out to. What's great is, you can create a cultivated feed. Your sales navigator feed and your LinkedIn feed are different, right, so you can create a separate feed for Sales Navigator for just those target organizations or people that perhaps you want to be following. You can even create links. You can embed links. You could send your podcast or you could send your newsletter out via this smart link that is part of Sales Navigator and you can see exactly who you are.
Speaker 1:Wow, I didn't know that. So much power in Sales Navigator and you can see exactly who you are Wow, I didn't know that.
Speaker 2:So much power in Sales Navigator.
Speaker 1:Okay, so literally that, just Pause, rewind, re-listen to what Carson just said. Go back I think it's either in 15 or 30 second chunks when you listen to it on a podcast, rewind. Think about the feed curation. I think sometimes on LinkedIn it can become a bit of an echo chamber of you see the same people in your feed. However, with this sales navigator tool, you can create these custom lists to make sure that you are engaging, checking in with seeing the updates of specific people that you want to be working with, building those relationships over time, and that also helps your time, like time management perspective. You're not going in, you're not searching for each individual person. You're able to keep like a nice diligent case, like pace, on finding all those people. That's huge.
Speaker 1:I will say I have a previous episode with Ariana Unai she's the head of LinkedIn for nonprofits where we talk about some of these things on episode 178 with Arianna Unai. This came out in April, the very beginning of April. That is huge, okay. So examples Are there any from your perspective? Microsoft Tech for social impact I'm sure you work with a lot of different organizations. Are there some leaders, some organizations that you've seen really excel at this, whether it's funding or visibility in a really meaningful way.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, when I think about it, it's, first and foremost how you show up as a leader. You know from the C-level, from the board level. You're an ambassador of your organization and what I think is amazing is when there's no better story to tell than a nonprofit story, in my opinion, and what I think is really powerful is when you, as a leader, are able to speak from the heart about very specific stories, highlighting and amplifying your team, amplifying your constituents and those you serve, and then also highlighting and amplifying opportunities to find out more or do more with your organization. What's great about LinkedIn and Sales Navigator? You can use these tools in a meaningful way every day, and it can look different every day. I have no agenda. When I even approach my own LinkedIn. I have no idea what I'll post this afternoon. I have no idea what I'll post tomorrow. It doesn't matter, it will come to me.
Speaker 1:I love that you just said there's no plan. Sometimes there's just no plan.
Speaker 2:No plan. Well, because life can take you in a different direction Totally. We all know and I think that's the key element, dana is, when I think about it also be intentional about how you're leveraging your content. We could do a podcast, we could do a story, we could do a blog. I did a podcast last week and it was published to YouTube.
Speaker 2:And I have a service called Opus AI which is out there. It's called Opus Clip. You can find it very easily. It will slice and dice 30-minute hour-long video into 30 second minute long clips. You can turn one piece of a 30 minute hour long content into 30 LinkedIn posts. You know just, and you could do a different one for each day of the week. You can take a transcript of a show you were on or something that you said on a team meeting internally and you could literally feed that into ChatGPT or Microsoft ProPilot and turn it into your next post or your next story. So be intentional about how you can leverage content that you've created today into multiple new avenues.
Speaker 2:And then, at the heart of it, I've always had this one fundamental Look, I was an old advertising and telecommunications sales guy.
Speaker 2:There was really no reason whatsoever why I should have been successful at Microsoft, the biggest tech company in the world. I've always tried to build community around what we do and around what I do, and I've always been very transparent and candid with the people I've worked with. But I'm also very proactive and responsive and communicative and those things have served me well. But I think, when you think about how organizations are using it and using it well, they're leveraging all the ways that they can to build community, build groups. I've seen people have Facebook groups. I've seen people have LinkedIn groups specifically for their nonprofit and posting, you know making articles or you know almost daily notes to their feed, like amplifying their team or showing where they are in the world and what they're doing and what's happening on the ground. And you know the things that make it personal and the things that show the people that interact or engage with that content the opportunity that they have to make a difference. That's the stuff that reaches out and grabs folks.
Speaker 1:So good.
Speaker 2:And so that's what I'm seeing the great non-profits and the great non-profit leaders do again. There's no silver bullet. There's no right or wrong answer. Pick the mediums that you want to play in and, believe me, I like I've been pulled into some mediums that I never would have anticipated, like tiktok, to my daughter's chagrin. But my point in saying that is like there's people out there everywhere that you can engage with. I mean, I have profiles that I post content to on YouTube, facebook, twitter, tiktok, wordpress.
Speaker 1:It's a free website and with all of those I do want to say do what feels manageable to you.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Pick one and what I would say is be consistent. There are many tools, like Carson, just mentioned, from AI, that can help you to have platform-specific content on all of those that meet the needs. But start with one, start with two that serve you the best that you can be consistent on, and don't be discouraged when you're just starting earlier on, if it just feels like crickets.
Speaker 1:You say this all the time and I promise you there are more impressions than there are engagements, which means people are seeing it, even if they're not responding right now, but they're seeing it. Carson, it has been a pleasure. Thank you so much for coming on with your busy, busy, busy day. We appreciate you and thank you for all that you do.
Speaker 2:Dana, thank you. I appreciate the important work that you do for our nonprofits as well, and hopefully this was valuable to your listeners.
Speaker 1:Yes, very, and everyone, please go check out the LinkedIn article. I'm so excited about this new term. I'm just creating the social fundraiser.
Speaker 2:I love it, it's happening. Trademark it today, daniel.
Speaker 3:Thanks, Carson.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for tuning into today's episode of Missions to Movements. If you enjoyed our conversation and found it helpful, I would love for you to take a moment to leave a review. Wherever you're listening, your feedback helps us reach more change makers like you and continue bringing impactful stories and strategies to the show. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button, too, so you'll never miss an episode. And until next time, keep turning your mission into a movement.
