Sarah --- I don't know about the other folks in this PND Talk group, but I welcome news of interesting new products, services, and promotions that are designed with the good of non-profits in mind. However,I do have a few suggestions regarding your particular brief announcement.You said:
> “Non-profits can successfully use this strategy to stop the cycle of raising funds from a position of lack.”
As I read that somewhat unclear statement, it does suggest to me that your strategy might be used by non-profits in place of their traditional, workable, and successful philanthropic style of fund-raising, apparently because they cannot seem to raise enough to meet their needs by those tried and true methods. Rather than saying “... stop the cycle of raising funds ...” you may be better off with suggesting that the sale of your product could be a source of additional income in the cycle of raising funds.
Rex is correct. The Girl Scouts have been the cookie sellers of great renown. But you should know that several years ago the Girl Scouts found it necessary to mount an extensive and long advertising - awareness campaign regarding the great sums of money they raised from the cookie sales which led the public to believe they needed no other money. The title of their ad campaign was, “Girl Scouts Can’t Live By Cookies Alone.”
That tells you all that you need to know regarding the limits of such product sales, as the Girl Scouts found out in a financially painful fashion. So, I advise that you take care with such Girl Scout product sales comparisons on the basis that they will solve all, or most, of the fund-raising needs of any non-profit.
You want to take care that any such claim could be taken as nothing more than a sales pitch not to be believed. You should know that for some time the non-profit world has been presented with more vendors selling a variety of products which all too often has the marketers making outrageous and misleading promises of big and easy money. You don’t want to be seen in that way. Touting a product or service as perhaps the main, or only, answer to the money needs of a non-profit is certainly not the way to gain credibility and trust.
I would promote that an organization institutes your product or sales program as additional and complimentary to their regular fund-raising, not as a replacement or alternative to it. When you make the latter statement, you are letting the non-profits know that you know and understand the realities and the importance of their fund-raising programs and initiatives. You are offering yet another revenue-generating program as something additional to what they do when they work long and hard to conduct the types of fund-raising campaigns which have always provided most of the money. Have that kind of sensitivity and real interest in the well-being of potential customers, and you will be far more successful.
Best wishes for success,
Tony Poderis
P. S.
To better know the needs of your potential non-profit customers, and what you can do to meet them, read my article:
--- Should Your Organization Sell Products And Services To Raise Money?
http://www.raise-funds.com/1001forum.html
