Marketing is Vital.

With over 300,000 registered non-profits in South Africa competing for funding with tertiary institutions, schools, clubs and faith-based entities, for funding, marketing is imperative. The majority of NPO staff and volunteers are fully occupied in fundraising and project delivery. Few can devote the time to urgently needed marketing tasks.

And not everyone understands how vital it is to ensure that their organisations stand out in a very crowded environment. Yet, people are more likely and more comfortable to give time and money to organisations that they've heard of – a classic Catch-22 situation. The corporate world understands how imperative it is to market its products and services, and to sustain doing so. Millions are spent annually on all aspects of marketing: advertising, public relations, sponsorship and market research surveys. Coca-Cola did not become and remain one of the best-known brands in the world, without ongoing marketing.

NPO marketing need not be expensive, but it must happen consistently. Marketing must be planned. A few social media posts do not constitute a marketing plan. Like all plans, the intentions, goals and objectives of marketing must be SMART: specific, measurable, action oriented, realistic and time defined. What will be done? How can this be assessed? Who will do what? Are their tasks doable? What are the deadlines?

NPO marketing need not be expensive, but it must happen consistently.

Marketing is the umbrella term under which public relations, advertising and all efforts to raise the profile of an organisation fall.

Too few non-profits even have corporate identity manuals (only one page would be a good start). The exact colours of the logo should be recorded (CMYK for printing and RGB for digital) and their use strictly enforced. Everyone within an organisation must be aware of the importance of its brand (name and logo) and precise colours.

Thinking creatively and maximising opportunities often don't take more than some time, with no additional costs:

• Are you using LinkedIn to position staff and volunteers (in the name of the organisation) as thought leaders in your area of service?
  
  
• Are you responding widely when crises in your field of work are topical?
  
  
• When you publicise an event, crowdfunding or capital campaign, are you maximising opportunities to share the mission of the organisation?
  
  
• Are you coming up with interesting and informative media releases (and not bombarding the media with releases that are not news-worthy and wonder why they are not used)?
  
  
• Are you tracking your impact statistics? There are often invaluable gems buried in quantitative M&E data. The 1,000^th homeless person's life turned around; the 100,000^th seabird saved; a century of service; the 10^th person to represent the country in sport, who spent a sports coaching afterschool facility; the 100^th person successfully prosecuted for rhino poaching, FGM or any other despicable behaviour that an NPO fights.
  
  
• Are you leaving the planning and posting on social media platforms to an intern (just because they are young)?
  
  
• Are you using the best/most appropriate social media platforms for your NPO? (If you don't have someone to regularly film appropriate TikTok videos, don't use the channel. If no one can constantly take photos or create images for Instagram, don't use it.)
  
  
• What have you built into your marketing planning to make your organisation stand out in the over 300,000-strong crowded space?
  
  
• One of the simplest, yet under-utilised, goals that should be part of a marking strategy is to be top-of-mind for media outlets seeking comments: an anti-animal cruelty organisation when firecrackers are expected; a child protection NPO when a child abuse story or statistics make the headlines; an organisation serving the homeless, GBV survivors or one concerned with climate change – who will they ask to comment or for an interview? They keep lists for rapid responses.