Simple tips for communicating about impact – Part 2

Nonprofits in Ontario are often asked about the technical details of their evaluation work — things like survey response rates, or the amount of measurable change. As we work toward a Sector Driven Evaluation Strategy, we’ve noticed that there aren’t as many opportunities to talk in-depth about why we do evaluation, and what we hope to learn. In Part 1 of this blog, we offered a few simple tips that might be helpful as you to start these conversations. These are strategies designed to help you get into the habit of talking about your work in impact language. In this second instalment, we cover three more tips for communicating about your impact. While the tips 1 to 3 focused on saying more about impact in your communication, these next three will cover how you can share the most effective information about your impact.  

Tip #4: Build messages that demonstrate your willingness to collaborate and learn

Some nonprofits build messages that make their program seem like the “silver bullet” or the “lone wolf” that can single-handedly solve a complex problem. Often, the implication here is that the only reason the program has not ALREADY solved the problem is that partners and funders have been slow to recognize just how fantastic the program is. This kind of messaging can turn partners off. It fails to acknowledge the ways in which other organizations may have helped to set the stage for your success and it also suggests that you don’t think you have any room to learn or improve. Ultimately, the best way to show that you have something unique and important to contribute is to demonstrate that you value the contributions of others. Here is an example:

DON’T ONLY SAY: “We know this program is the solution. We’ve known it for a long time. The only problem is that people haven’t been willing to give us enough money to do it.”

INSTEAD SAY: “Here is information about the impact we have been able to achieve to date. With your help to expand the program, we would be able to reach X new people, including Y people from a group we aren’t reaching right now. This would help to fill a key gap in service that has been identified in local research.”

Tip #5:  Build focused and consistent outcome messages

You wouldn’t trust a salesperson who told you that their miracle cleaning product was equally effective on kitchen counters, aluminum siding, and silk shirts. But nonprofits sometimes make the mistake of claiming too many outcomes — rather than zooming in on the specific, concrete things that their program does really well. Nonprofits take great pride in their willingness to be flexible and their commitment to meet the unique needs of each client, and often do achieve a wide range of outcomes. Programs that most effectively communicate their impact, however, focus on the three to five concrete, short-term outcomes that are at the core of their operations.

A closely related mistake is being inconsistent with your outcome language. Some programs, in an effort to please multiple funders, use very different outcomes language for some audiences than they do for others. Some even show “slippage” in their outcome messaging within a single conversation. Here are a few examples demonstrating both cases:

DON’T ONLY SAY: “I’m looking at the list of outcomes provided by our funder, and our program achieves ALL of them.”  OR  “Our drop-in helps newcomers be job ready. Other times, it is more about helping them feel welcome in the community.  Our impact can also be as much on our volunteers as it is on our participants. This all sets the stage for our advocacy work.”

INSTEAD SAY: “Our program’s primary focus is creating a sense of belonging for newcomers. We define ‘belonging’ as including three key elements: participation in community life; access to support; and sense of connection to place.”

Tip #6: Build messages that connect with your audience

Have you ever had a friend return from an exotic destination and tell you that you simply must go see it for yourself? You know your friend had a wonderful time but you aren’t really any further ahead in deciding whether this destination would be a good fit for you. A tourism company wouldn’t last very long if it couldn’t effectively communicate the value of a destination in a way potential visitors understood. Great marketing goes beyond simply listing the features of a destination. It focuses on outcomes that matter to you.

Sometimes, nonprofits claim that their impact can’t be captured through evaluation, and must be personally experienced in order to be appreciated. However, if nonprofits aren’t willing to take the rich, complex, colourful reality of their programming and do the work necessary to explain it in terms that will resonate with their target audience, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that they don’t have a captive audience. Strong messages focused on outcomes create opportunities to connect to your audience:

DON’T ONLY SAY: “We could send you stats, but they don’t tell the real story. Our outcomes are different for every client, and they are changing all the time because we meet each client wherever they are. Our work is too complex for evaluation.”

INSTEAD SAY: We work with very vulnerable youth, and each of them face a complex and unique set of challenges. Our work is constantly evolving and we help youth in many different ways. However, our focus is always on using the arts to build life skills. Here is some data on the changes we have made in three asset areas that are particularly important. Here is a story that shows how these changes happened in the life of one youth. We are having an open house next month, if you are interested in learning more.”

Key Takeaways:

Communicating about your program in a way that emphasizes impact is a great way to build support for your work. People find this kind of communication compelling because it answers the questions so what? and why should I care? The key things to remember are:
1. Focus. Talk about a small number of outcomes that are in your wheelhouse. Talk about them consistently.
2. Listen. Show that you know and use local research on social issues. Show that you know your unique niche and how your work complements and enhances what others are doing.
3. Share. Show that you are committed to ongoing feedback. Show that you can contribute useful data to a shared impact report. Acknowledge your mistakes as well as your successes. Demonstrate that you have learned from your evaluation and that you are adapting.
4. Engage. Seek out opportunities to talk about impact and to understand it in more depth. Using your own behaviour as an example, invite your funders and partners to focus, to know their context, and to share.
We’ve compiled all six tips for communicating impact along with a handy dandy Impact Message Builder into one resource that you can access here.