Should you stick with it or take a break?

humor, journey, arriving, lead

When it comes to messaging and language and words, it’s easy to get stuck. You’ve stared at the same set of words for hours. You want to yank your hair out. But the deadline is looming. You must stick with it!!!

Yes, you have to remain focused on your priority for the day. But maybe what you need is a good ol’ peregrination. Yep, some purposeful mental meandering might be exactly what you need to get you to your goal. 

Not sure what a peregrination is? Kick up your heels and find it in this week’s podcast. You just might find that taking a break gets you closer to arriving at your destination.


What karate taught me about marketing










Pitching Passion & Passionate Pitching

engagement, connection, marketing, fundraising, strategy

Engagement Cycle: know, understand, engage

Most people passionate about what they do have one of two reactions when someone asks about their work.

Reaction #1: In a blur of words and hand gestures, they share every single amazing tidbit of info they have in their brain about their mission, vision, values. The impact they are having. The change they are making. The awesome that they are unleashing in the name of making the world a better place! They pause only long enough to ask themselves: “How could someone not jump at the chance to be a part of something that is so, so, so, so fabulous?!!!!!!!!!”

Reaction #2: They give the most boring account ever of what they do and why they do it. No passion is present. It evaporates into thin air. Poof. Gone.

Both of these reactions happen for the same reasons: these poor people have fallen into the “elevator pitch” trap, which mushes three pitches into one, AND they don’t know how to channel their enthusiasm for their work. So they either over talk or under talk. Either way. It’s ain’t pretty.

If you want donors to donate, volunteers to volunteer, board members to serve, etc etc etc, you have to create a clear engagement path that is supported by a series of pitches. I went into this when introducing the #FixMyPitch contest I’m doing with Beth Kanter, so you can get all the details in that post. The bottom line is you need to divide your pitches into three categories: know, understand and engage. (Note that there is no ‘elevator pitch’ category. Like phones with chords, that category is a thing of the past.)

In the coming weeks, we’ll be revealing the before and after pitches for the contest winners.  In the meantime, ask yourself: “do I have a clear engagement path with supporting pitches?” If you don’t, read the #FixMyPitch post, watch for the before and after examples, and start structuring the passion in your pitches by divvying them up into three tidy categories, rather than mushing them into one extinct category!

Personas are people, too!


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What do I do with all these personas?!





The short answer is: you don’t.




  1. What is the goal of this piece?







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Raising money isn’t a goal

fundraising, non profits, marketing, goals, strategy, tactics

You raise money SO THAT you can make a difference.

Yesterday, we kicked off the latest Accelerator.




SO THAT…struggling families can access life-changing resources.
SO THAT…small business owners can become financially fluent.



What’s your SO THAT?