Care2's Digital Engagement Blog

 Are Google Analytics your best friend? Does data that gives you insight into your fundraising and advocacy strategy make you happy? If not, they should be. Analytics and metrics are what should be informing your content, your strategy, and your nonprofit campaigns.

Recently General Assembly and HubSpot teamed up to generate a report to fill you in on all the important metrics: Introduction to Inbound Marketing Analytics and the Key Metrics Your Executives Want To See.

They cover what your analytics should look like, and what exactly you should be measuring.

But you also don’t have to be metric-savvy before diving into the report. All the lingo is clearly laid out and defined:

 A couple of weeks ago, we talked about why millennials are one of your best audiences. Today we are digging a little deeper into some of the great research from The Millennial Impact Project about how to better connect with millennials. 

The Millennial Impact Project released their Top 100 data points based on 6 years of millennial cause and workplace engagement research. This data will help your nonprofit better involve the next generation in your fundraising campaigns, volunteer projects, cause initiatives, and programming. Here’s a highlight of the top findings:

 Millennials have been pigeonholed as being lazy, but when it comes to social justice issues, Millennials are quite passionate about causes and donate money to the issues they support. With all these mixed messages, how can your nonprofit really dig in and learn what Millennials need, and how to reach them? Or maybe you’re reading this as a Millennial who’s working at or running a nonprofit, and want to know how to reach your own generation most effectively?

Did you know that women make contributions to twice as many charitable organizations as men do? Studies have also shown that women bring in half or more of the income in 55% of U.S. households. And women ages 50 and older control a net worth of $19 trillion. Furthermore, women are expected to soon control 70 percent of all planned giving assets.

Next week, the Care2 Team will join more than 5,000 passionate volunteers in Washington, D.C. for the Points of Light National Conference on Volunteering and Service.  Leaders and volunteers from the nonprofit, corporate and government sectors will gather in over 150 workshops to exchange ideas and inspire one another on topic areas including National Service, Nonprofit Capacity Building, Volunteer Management and Youth Service and Leadership.

We’ve talked about the importance of breaking down silos before. Frequently, the best innovative solutions to community challenges are those that creatively combine ideas from multiple disciplines. To find those creative solutions, it’s important for nonprofit advocates, communicators, and program directors to challenge barriers, habits, and assumptions that separate us from other offices, “competing” peer organizations, and disciplines.

Millennials often get a bad reputation for being slackers and self absorbed, but they can actually be quite passionate about social justice issues, especially when the right causes resonate with them. Make no mistake, if you are trying to reach Millennials you're organization is going to need spend time and resources developing meaningful campaigns that they feel connected to, and use their preferred methods of online and mobile communications. But once you have them engaged, they can be some of your best advocates. Furthermore, with the right ladder of engagement strategies, they can be cultivated as donors over the long term.