- [Announcer] Live from your public media studios, WVIA presents "Keystone Edition Business," a public affairs program that goes beyond the headlines to address issues in Northeastern and Central Pennsylvania.

This is "Keystone Edition Business."

And now, moderator, Kris Jones.

- Hello, I'm Kris Jones.

In a world where we're bombarded by advertising, it can be hard for a lot of organizations to get their message out there.

Nonprofits may have it tougher than most.

They often operate on a very thin budget and may not have the funds to boost social media ads or do widespread television campaigns, but there are low cost or even free tools available to give those nonprofits a boost.

We have experts here, ready to share what they know about marketing.

Call in at 1-833-408-9842.

Email us at keystone@wvia.org or tag us on social with the #Keystonebusiness.

But first, WVIA's Paul Lazar has some tips on marketing for nonprofits.

- [Paul] Marketing for nonprofit is all about bringing awareness to the group's cause or mission, inviting donations and attracting volunteers and support.

Fundraising is key to any nonprofit and raising awareness is a huge part of that.

If more people know about the cause, that opens the door to more potential funding.

Nonprofit budgets are often limited, but not every solution requires the expending.

Experts recommend leveraging social media as a way to engage the community.

It's a way to advertise events and get members involved through posts and comments.

They can also create content to share on social media that tells the story of people involved in the organization.

Many nonprofits have their own YouTube channels that they use to tell those stories and they can use it as a fundraising platform.

Email marketing is another low cost avenue to share events, services, and blog posts.

For more information and tips on marketing for nonprofits, head to wvia.org.

For "Keystone Edition Business," I'm Paul Lazar.

- Hi, welcome for this edition of "Keystone Edition."

If you're involved at a nonprofit and have questions about getting the message out, give us a call at 1-833-408-9842.

We have experts ready to share what they know.

First, Linda Loop is the founder and CEO of Dress for Success of Luzerne County.

Next, Mike McGinley has spent several years as a communication chair of Junior Achievement.

And Tony Bartocci is the president of Posture Interactive in Scranton.

Guests, welcome.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- Linda, we're gonna start with you and give you an opportunity to tell the viewers more about Dress for Success of Luzerne County.

- Well, our mission is to empower women to achieve economic independence.

And we do this in three ways.

First, we provide a network of support for all women who are coming out of difficult situations and trying to get into the job market.

Second, we provide great career, appropriate attire.

And third, we provide the career development tools that a woman needs to thrive in work and in life.

So I'm very quick to say we don't just provide clothing, we help to change lives.

- [Kris] Wow.

And where are you located?

- [Linda] We're at 38 West market street, Downtown Wilkes-Barre.

- Excellent.

And I can't wait to come back to you in just a few minutes and talk about some of the success that you've had recently.

Mike, let's move on to you.

Tell us more about, you're a mover and shaker here in Northeastern, Pennsylvania.

You're a familiar face to a lot of people watching right now, I'm sure, but you're also a public servant and you're involved in the community as on the board of Junior Achievement.

Tell us more about Junior Achievement.

- Yep.

Thank you, Kris.

Well, I'm lucky enough to be on the board and to be the communications chair of the organization.

There are more than 100 Junior Achievements throughout the country, and we're lucky enough to have one here in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

We serve 13 counties, kindergarten through 12th grade, working with students of all those different ages.

And we really look to teach children financial literacy, career readiness, and then to prepare them for their futures.

So we work with children from a very young age and kind of move with them through the school system, both in classroom volunteering and virtual learning to prepare them for a future once they graduate.

- One of the interesting things I think about Junior Achievement is that you guys have taken a sort of a role play approach to it.

So you take these kids and you give them an opportunity to feel like business owners, to feel like entrepreneurs.

My experience and exposure to Junior Achievement would suggest that that's a really smart way to inspire the future generation of leaders and entrepreneurs.

- It's amazing to see at the end of the program how these kids know how to balance a checkbook, they understand what it is to open a business, how to go about putting together even a small business plan, really life skills that they'll need for the rest of their lives, whether they open a business or just part of a community.

It's teaching them how to be good community leaders.

- Excellent.

Thank you.

And Tony, so you're the president of Posture Interactive, tell us more about it.

- Yeah.

Posture has been located downtown Scranton for over 10 years.

We specialize in a few buckets, I call them.

A lot of graphic design branding.

So people come to us, maybe having a new business idea and we help them realize and tell that story both visually and with a little plan or maybe it's a business that just needs a little bit of a refresh.

We do a lot of that design and carry that through to the next bucket, which I'll put as our custom development.

So we do websites large and small, sales, inventory, simple things that just really tell, again, the story in both a functional and technical way.

And then we love things that move.

So we do a lot of content development and that could be anything from anything on social media to a lot of video production, motion graphics, explainer videos, and that true content marketing plan that really helps our clients kind of get the message out.

Clients by the way, range all over, we have, probably our split is probably half in this region and half around the country, which we're really, given our type of, the technology that exists to really talk to anyone anywhere, we spread the love as much as we can, especially to the topic today of our nonprofits, which I'm really excited to be here today to be able to use some of our tools that we have to apply them to really, again, get that story out.

- You know, having you on the show, I only knew indirectly that you guys were sort of a leading agency with nonprofits, but I'll tell you, in preparing for the show, so impressive, the amount of work that you guys have done.

And I look forward to giving you an opportunity to share some of those successes in just a little bit.

Linda, coming back to you, let's share some success stories, right?

We're gonna peel back the onion and dive into really how difficult it is for nonprofits.

We're gonna get there.

But I think it's important to share with the viewers and to other nonprofit leaders, there's so many of them that success is out there.

So let's talk about one of your most recent fundraisers that was around empowering women and women in power.

So tell us more about that and lay out how successful it was and how you went about it.

- Well, March is Women's History Month, and several years ago, Dress for Success, our worldwide organization decided that we were gonna own Women's History Month and they created a celebration surrounding March 8th, which is International Women's Day.

And it had a lot of impact overseas.

So we took it into a United States effort.

And a few years ago, working with Lindsay at the Greater Wyoming Valley Chamber, she and I were talking and, "How could we support each other?"

And I said, "International Women's Day."

Women in this area haven't had a luncheon in a while and we appreciate that.

So we went for two years doing lunches and different types of mentor auctions.

And then Holly came on our board, Holly Pilcavage, I'm sorry from Coal Creative.

- She was in, to be fair, she was a former guest on this show.

- [Linda] Yes.

- But she is such a dynamic young woman and professional in Luzerne County.

Please go ahead.

- And Holly is a dear friend, and now, serving as our board chair.

And she decided that she wanted to do a 31 Days of Women In Power campaign, which was a multi-layered multimedia campaign to highlight different women in our region.

And nobody had to vote.

Your dollars bought you a vote, which was outstanding for us.

And there was a t-shirt piece in there.

And depending on the level of your sponsorship because it was a sponsored campaign, those are the incentives and the materials you got for it.

And this year, I did some rough accounting today.

We stand to make just under $19,000.

For when enough a profit leader doesn't have to do anything and people were asking me questions and I was like, "I don't know.

I empowered Holly on, let's ask Holly about this and she could tell us more."

So we were really lucky and blessed with this campaign.

- I was really proud to watch it all play out.

And I think, kudos to Holly, but kudos to you as well for empowering her.

- Yeah.

- And then to empower all these other women from organizations throughout Luzerne County who stepped up to the plate and said, "We'll put some sponsorship money or some donation money behind this campaign."

And it was just great.

- Imagine in this economy and in this environment, in these times, our luncheon sold out twice.

We had to have add more seating to it.

And we were very proud that we had every female sitting judge in Luzerne County and it's an amazing time for women in this county and those women know enough to turn around and help another women.

So it is about empowering women.

And the better our women do in our society, the better everybody does.

- Yeah.

That's wonderful.

- [Linda] Thank you.

- Mike, so at Junior Achievement of Northeastern Pennsylvania, I know you guys are really proud of an annual event you do called the Business Hall of Fame.

Tell us more about that and how you use it to raise funds for your organization.

- And Kris, you probably know, a lot about the business Hall of Fame as a past recipient, a Hall of Fame Inductee.

But every year, we induct some new business owner into our Hall of Fame at Junior Achievement.

We've been doing it for over a dozen years, leaders from all different areas of business within the community.

And this year, we were able to do it again virtually, thankfully or in person in the fall, after doing a two years virtually.

So to be able to bring that back and to see the excitement in the room and the way in which all the community members showed up, families, students showed up to support the people who were being honored, we were able to induct Heather Acker from Gentex as our Hall of Fame Inductee this year, Zubeen Saeed from Building Blocks Learning Center as the Entrepreneur of the Year, and then Jade Cotter from Pittston Area School District as our Educator of the Year.

So we got to honor a variety of people.

And with that, fortunately, does bring sponsorship dollars, more so than when you do something virtually.

So being able to bring it back, we had it at the Radisson in Downtown Scranton.

And so many sponsors turned out because they were so proud of the work that these three women had done in the community.

They were proud to be a part of the event and they were proud to be there, and we didn't make it a sit down dinner.

We made it more of an informal type of event where people could stand or sit where they wanted to but they didn't have to feel crowded in and they ended up just loving it.

So we're able to raise more than $60,000, which is more than we had raised obviously, the year prior.

- That's great.

Awesome.

And Tony, one of your, in my opinion, one of the flagship nonprofit events that you get behind and help power is NEPA Gives.

So share with our viewers a little bit more about what NEPA Gives is, and maybe what role Posture Interactive had.

- Yeah, absolutely love NEPA Gives.

And I think what's so special about it is that any nonprofit can get involved.

We we're partnering with the Scranton Area Community Foundation who spearheads it of all the community foundations in the entire region.

So a lot of people get behind this and the whole goal is a 24-hour fundraising event and giving event, obviously, but we kicked this off originally just as COVID was coming.

So we were approached with the challenge of what happens to have this great event, get people encouraged, and firing up their fan base, and then not being able to have a really a central point to do it.

So over the years, and we'll be in our third year now, we've gone from a Zoom type part in the first year to last year.

We built an entire set inside the Hilton Scranton and did 24-hour live broadcast as we had challenges throughout the day.

And that was with an entire marketing kit and how each brand could get involved.

And this year, we're planning something even bigger, I think.

So the team at the Scranton Area Community Foundation, they last year, surpassed over $1 million in total donations, over 200 organizations participated, and the day is just, it's just awesome.

And if you're a nonprofit, by the way, you could still get involved, signing up up until towards the end of May.

NEPA Gives this year is June 3rd.

It's a wonderful Friday and 24 hours of awesomeness.

- Wow.

And for folks that are trying to write that down, they could check out the wvia.org website, go on Keystone Edition Business, and we'll have some links on there.

So now, in the nonprofit world, you're basically limited by so many constraints, just as, all encompassing resources.

What are some of the most difficult challenges that you face in marketing your organization?

- The time.

We think, I don't know that serving my clients is what I feel like I'm there for.

So making posts, marketing it, it all just becomes so much.

And then if you're gonna write a grant, if you're, your day becomes, I mean, it's great that it's so diverse that your day is all over the place, but at the same point, you wanna focus on your mission and that's to help for me, to empower women.

So when I'm sitting down doing Facebook posts, or, it's not always easy to keep a team going and updating a website and sending out mass emails and, that's a full-time job in itself.

And then you get called in on another campaign to do this and that, and NEPA Gives, and it's like, you know, all the balls are up in the air and a client calls and needs something to go to work.

And that's what I have to focus on.

So it's a challenge.

- I would agree.

It's like, there's so much to do in the course of the day and how do you get it all done.

You're trying to get your message out there, but it makes it challenging when you don't have that full staff that maybe people need.

- So, what's interesting is we have a limited amount of time left, about 12 or so minutes to get into the tactics.

And we're gonna let Tony lead the way, but let's start with the prerecorded video that we put together of WVIA TV Director of Digital, Chris Zellers on this magnificent program called the Google Ad Grants Programme.

Let's go ahead and play that.

- So Google AdWords is a way to essentially get your business to the front of the line in Google Search.

It consists of creating advertisements that are based around keywords.

Google kind of gives a leg up to nonprofits, utilizing what's known as the Google Ad Grant.

And with the Google Ad Grant, your business, as long as you're a 501(c)(3) registered nonprofit, you're entitled a $10,000 worth of free Google advertising every month through Google Adverts.

And so it's a very, very powerful tool that I would encourage any nonprofit to make sure that you're utilizing.

So Google AdWords has helped WVIA immensely when it comes to our web traffic.

We end up getting somewhere in the realm of 16% of our annual traffic to wvia.org as a result of this Google Ad Grant.

So if you're in a nonprofit, check to see that your nonprofit is registered for Google for nonprofits because that will entitle you to the Google Ad Grant.

Once that's in place, make sure that you're constantly updating your ads and monitoring the performance of those ads to make sure that you're not wasting any of that money because that $10,000 a month doesn't carry over month to month.

So you're gonna wanna make sure that you're spending as much as you can every month.

- So let's dive a little bit deeper into how these nonprofits can use tools that are available to them.

So Chris talked about Google Ad Grants.

But Tony, can you speak to some of the other big platforms that exist?

Maybe additional programs like Google, YouTube, Facebook?

- Certainly.

Google to start, spreads the love.

So with that $10,000 ad grant, it's huge.

And it's always, it's just sitting there waiting to be used.

So are you aware of any of this goodness?

We'll chat there.

It's in kind, it's the text side of those ads.

It's different than a paid site.

So you could have both running concurrently.

We'll talk a little bit of that, but Google offers a whole suite of that side.

So even of the branded email, so the Google Workspace side and all, everything that comes with a normal Gmail professional account, also included in kind by Google.

Google owns YouTube as well.

So they spread the love there with different tactics and different tap to donate and other options that can exist while you're playing on your YouTube channel.

But there's a bunch of big companies that help spread, I'll say the, spreading the love and really using some things that are either in kind totally or just a very minor discount for that.

We can get into some like visual side now if you want, I mean, I think as far as like, yeah.

- Well, you know what's interesting?

so we all could relate, like the viewers could relate to the ALS ice bucket challenge.

Remember this a bunch of years ago?

They raised, what did I have in my notes?

They had raised over $100 million in like six months, right?

We dumped the bucket of ice and we raised awareness importantly, but we also raised funds.

So storytelling and video, which I think you were starting to go there.

So continue.

I think it's just so important.

- Everything starts with that story.

I think, although we love if you came to Posture and you had a whole video production of something, we love making things that move, but you have a phone.

You can make things that move too to start and really just connect something that just needs to resonate.

It's the most important thing.

Whether you have puppies or dresses, you just seem to connect that personal story.

And I think that's what's so powerful about your campaign is really just the feels you get, the cohort that happens and that halo effect of seeing someone that just resonates and tells a great story and having that person do the same thing.

That was what it was, so kudos to that.

That was a great one to look on from a great colleague.

So it's really just connecting and finding that passion of what is gonna have that final trigger to hit the button, and then in this case, donate.

- Let's not forget about Facebook.

Does Facebook have anything for nonprofits?

- Facebook has a bunch of tools and mainly on the, how the one click to donate side of things.

So there's a whole nonprofit, it's getting further developed always, but there's a lot of, I will get it more, it's just the simple call to action to make it the no-brainer side of how you promote events, how you quickly get some connections in there with commerce.

But once you get into that nonprofit sphere and are registered, the biggest, I think for me, is how that donation works and the portions of how all that works, moreso with those calls to action, to make it again, the no-brainer to sign up for the event or make a donation.

- And again, to the viewers, check out the website, wvia.org.

Tony's website will be on there.

If he can't take you on and help you, he could certainly point you in the right direction.

Correct?

- [Tony] Of course.

Yeah.

- Of course.

So Linda, so earlier you said time, and so I'm gonna phrase my question for you a little bit different than giving us a marketing tactic, how important are volunteers and also, how important are partnerships to doing what you do?

- Well, they're critical.

I couldn't do what I do without volunteers.

I know that if I'm processing clothing donations and steaming clothes, I'm not marketing and you know, no money, no mission.

And so I'm not working on what I need to do as the CEO.

And so it's critical and.

- [Kris] Partnerships?

- Partnerships, well, partnerships are fantastic because they enable you to use a bigger audience.

And for me, a lot of times, it's better quality product.

I mean, I got three cases of Coach coats to give to clients this year.

I've got wonderful partnerships with Ulta cosmetics, Talbots.

So the larger partnerships help get our name out and we know that a larger audience sees us.

So those partnerships are critical and even the local ones, especially.

- What about champions?

So Holly Pilcavage, we mentioned earlier is somewhat of an anomaly, and that's an absolute compliment to Holly.

but to find these ambassadors, to find these evangelists, would you consider that to be probably the highlight or one of the highlights of the success of your program?

- I believe it is.

And I also think that for a woman's, for our organization, a lot of our women find us.

And although we can't be passive about it, I know that for a while, I had a man who was chair of our board and he worked at the nuclear power plant and he brought this information to women in nuclear and they were like, "Yeah, we got this."

Boom and turned it into, "Here, give her $1,000."

I'm like, "Okay, great."

And he was like, "Linda, I had no idea."

I was like, "Women network differently than men do.

We're not as loud.

We just get it done," which is a good thing and part of the problem that we have with marketing.

Gotta get it done.

So that's what we do.

- Well, Tony had mentioned earlier telling stories.

Mike, when I think about the Hall of Fame dinner, I think about telling other people stories.

At the end of the day, is great content about keeping people sort of you tell me, is it entertained, is it educated, is it informed, is it empowered in Linda's case, by empowering women?

How do you become a really good storyteller?

- It's really about telling real stories and talking about what's happened in someone's life, how they got to where they're at.

It's not really sugar coating anything.

It's being very authentic, getting the true message out there, whether it be in print, in video.

For us, videos do very, very well.

People have connected well with those.

And that's what's gotten people show up at our events and really champion for us is that visual medium, where people are able to see and hear what others have gone through and then longer form within print products, whether that be on a blog, a website, a newspaper, wherever that may be.

But it's truly telling that story in the correct way for whatever medium you're marketing it at.

- I think authentic is the keyword there.

There is so much, you're inundated with a boatload of everything, wherever.

- Press releases.

- Right.

And you just want something real like you just like, and I think the consumer, the potential donor, the whomever is well in tune with when it's this overproduced fake facade, and just tell me the story and it totally connects.

So typically when we work with partners, it's more of the, "I don't don't know what to post," or "I can't possibly put myself out there."

And I think they find success in just being real and just taking that step 'cause if you go and edit it 17 times, it's probably not getting your actual message out as intended.

- Yeah.

Audiences feel more compelled to act when they know something's real.

- It's brilliant.

Mobile.

Most people are consuming content on their mobile devices.

Believe it or not, we only have about a minute and 20 seconds left in the show, but give some tips to the viewers, and Linda and Mike up here on mobile.

How would you go differently about a campaign on mobile?

- I think for sure, just consider the medium of the, what is the media gratification.

We've done a lot of things that maybe could be a simple text or what is a link that in your case, if we're trying to get the cash monies, what is that immediate gratification and the least amount of taps to get to that?

So not page upon page upon page.

QR codes have made this amazing comeback.

Americans didn't like it a couple years ago.

Now, we're back.

- I was wrong on that one.

I was wrong on a bunch of things, but I was wrong on QR codes.

I'm like.

- So scan away.

And with that, it's not just going onto a link.

There's so many triggers or action points that you could go online, use a free generator and have it do a variety of things to get your mission.

And that's been a new fun thing from whatever restaurant you're in to, even scanning the screen right now and getting some immediate action taken and taking the guesswork out of it for your end user.

- Are you gonna have a QR code program for NEPA Gives?

- [Mike] Oh yeah.

We already having planned notes.

- Oh yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Tune in June 3rd, of course, yes.

- And so you'll be able to see what's, is there gonna be an auction?

- There's a variety of challenges throughout the day.

And the great thing is if you're a business, you can get involved and help use the marketing kit to get involved with a nonprofit.

And throughout the entire day, there's challenges that your $500 becomes 1,000 and this 10,000 becomes this and your $10, all that, that there's different things that go on on your computer, on site, on everything.

- Well, I wish all three of you the best in everything this year as you support nonprofits.

I'd like to thank all of our guests for participating and thank you for joining us.

For more information on this topic and some marketing tips for nonprofits, please visit wvia.org/keystonebusiness.

And remember, you can re-watch this episode on demand anytime online or on the WVIA app.

For "Keystone Edition," I'm Kris Jones.

Thank you for watching.

(slow electric music)