 So thrilled to have you back here. Another episode of the nonprofit show. Today, Julie and I are thrilled to have John DeLane in the hot seat. John serves as the CEO of DeLane Marketing Group and is here to share about reflecting values in fundraising. And I don't think we've really had this type of topic or theme as it relates to our guest episode today. So stay with us to hear more from John before we jump into this conversation, we want to remind you who we are. So hello to Julia Patrick, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. We can thank her for this platform and the two weeks that she thought it would be. And here we are literally marching towards 700 episodes. And I'm honored Julia to be here as your co-host day in and day out, nonprofit nerd, also CEO of the Raven Group. And we are also always very honored and grateful to have the ongoing support and investment, plus their trust, 100% trust for these unscripted episodes. 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I had kind of been stalking you on LinkedIn, I follow you and I'm like, we must have you as a guest. I really wanna hear your voice and perspective. So thank you for joining us today. Welcome. Thank you so much, Jared. Julia, wonderful to meet you on the broadcast here today as well. I'm excited to share a bit of my story and background with the audience and jump through the sharing of our values through our fundraising efforts. There's a lot of different ways that we could take this conversation. I'll start with a little bit of my background if that's helpful for people. Yeah, please do. So my story begins on a farm. I grew up on a strawberry and raspberry farm in West Michigan. It's a very tasty place to grow up. We picked strawberries. I got hauled in by my grandma to help for a moment here and there and five hours later I'd find myself at the other end of the field after weeding. So that was a wonderful way to learn diligence and character traits from my parents and grandparents. I was somebody that wanted to make a difference and so later on I ended up working in politics for a few years. I worked in Michigan, the Michigan State Capitol and on the governor's campaign in Texas and then a mentor challenged me to consider where I wanted to be in 10 years and still working in politics is a grueling, grueling challenge. I'll tell you what, no matter what side you're on it's a tough spot to be. So that was how I ended up working in fundraising. Still wanting to make a difference. I came back to Michigan and worked with a local crisis pregnancy center helping people understand their options, have better parenting materials, abstinence training and I led our fundraising team to our first million dollar a year at the center. So it was exciting. There were a number of challenges as most small nonprofits run into we felt locked into doing what we'd always done. I took over, I was a young director of development in my early twenties and we had been doing one of our events for longer than I had been alive, unchanged. And so as you might expect we had declining participation rates, lower fundraising dollars from that specific event, things like that. And so it was a great experience. I'm thankful for it. I had a opportunity in that time too with my background on the farm always trying to build and grow things to start doing digital marketing. So that was when Delang marketing group came around. I worked with another agency to do fulfillment and worked on clients from furniture to finance to faith organizations. And then later on took on a role with summit ministries concurrently with my business. So managing major donor work and now our direct mail and digital campaigns at summit. So I'm excited to go through this process with you and reflect some of the things that maybe we've seen from our chair at a faith-based organization about how to reflect our values in our interactions with stakeholders. Absolutely. Yeah, and thank you for that. All I can think of for the berries is like, I bet you had such fantastic jellies and jams and pies and it was just like, yeah, my mouth watered as you stated that. You know, it's really interesting thing, John, to think about communicating values in a digital world and especially since the outbreak of the pandemic, how it really forced us all to be much more digitally oriented. That had to really impact your storytelling and your messaging. And we had a guest on yesterday that talked about tech stacks and it just so happens that you're on today and you actually know our guest from yesterday, Tim Locky, which is crazy and fabulous, but talk to us how the tech stacks can really help you navigate or undermine even those value propositions in those relationships. Sure. So this is a great example of it. It's the power of technology to make connections between people who wouldn't have otherwise been connected. So Tim Locky is out in Bozeman, Montana and because of activity on LinkedIn, I was able to have a wonderful coffee with him just a couple of weeks ago after a major donor event that I was working in Big Sky. I got to see his hometown. We walked around the shady streets of Bozeman and I couldn't agree more with some of the things that he shared on this show yesterday about the change management and the fact that no matter what we have with technology, it's still people that are using it at the end of the day. For me, I work day to day with a Christian nonprofit and that affects my worldview. I'm a Christian and my understanding of technology has to flow from my prior beliefs. So one of the ways that that looks practically in our philanthropy is that we're reflecting back to our creator, the things that he's already given us. As someone who believes in the Bible and the story of creation, our creator is a giver. He gave us a wonderful world. He gave us an opportunity to be free from our sin and shame and being made in his image. We have to value the people that are in front of us and the people that we interact with, whether that's through technology, in person, in a donor relationship. So that I believe two things follow from that worldview. The joy of giving and receiving is embedded in each one of us. And the other thing is a people-centered approach is absolutely the best way to go in our philanthropy. We have to reflect that in our technology stacks. Thank you for that. And I really have seen where philanthropy, giving, generosity, I'm curious, like if we go back to the early, early stages, if it began with faith-based, right? If it began with tithing, if it began with that whole give back to be of service and to serve others. So I love that you're coming at us today from that perspective, because when I think of people, when they give, I feel like if you are entrenched in your faith-based life, then typically the organization you're giving to first is that faith-based organization. And so having you speak to this when it comes to text stacks, facilitating values and relationships, I love that you're sharing that. So tell us more, and I know that we're gonna have a couple of more key talking points from you as well, but I'm all ears. 100%. Yeah, absolutely. So Dr. Mark Dillon, the former vice president of Wheaton College says that he quotes a study in his book, Giving and Getting in the Kingdom, that the single biggest predictor of philanthropic activity is regular attendance at a church or synagogue. And so that's surprising to some people and not surprising to others. But I think that what our attitude should be, when we go through the process of doing fundraising activities in a faith-based setting, we have to get rid of, I don't know if you've had Jason Lewis on the show before, but he says we have to be done with what he calls arms-length fundraising, where we do the cheapest, quickest, low-risk, shallow efforts to get the most nominal gift from someone that's just a little bit more than the cost of acquisition. And while that may work on paper, it doesn't actually honor the individual who's on the other side of those relationships. I had a visit as a major donor officer for some ministries a couple of years ago, and I went to see a donor who had made a gift and got to drive around their hometown. We ate dinner out. They showed us all the restaurants. We had homemade French toast at their house the next morning, and they handed me a check for a hundred dollars at the end of the evening and said, I wish I could give more. And the rest of the story there, sounds like I wasn't a very good steward of my time. If the story stopped there, the rest of the story was their son-in-law had passed away and they sold their home in Florida and moved back to the Midwest to be with to cover the medical expenses and to care for their grandchildren. And as a person representing the organization, I could honor them in their decades-long relationship with the organization, not only with giving and getting financial transaction, but also in being there relationally for them. It's a, there's a lot of ways that we can do it at scale as well. You know, we talk in our sector about the three T's, time, talent and treasure, you know? And when you said, you know, they made a gift, a hundred dollars, but they put so much love into their time, right? And that French toast, I guarantee it was probably the best you've ever had. But coming from their own values and their own place of financial, you know, capacity in that moment, I find great respects, like finding the balance of the value that sure, as professional fundraisers, are we looking for many zeros of course, but are we also looking to build that return on relationship, Julia, that we talk about? You know, and who knows where that relationship will go in the future, as well as how many other individuals they share your visit with to help increase awareness? Yeah, absolutely. And there's, there's so much of this too that happens at scale, right? We, you know, in the major donor world and in my role as director of development, I had a number of relationships where, you know, I could be there in person, but most often I talk to executive directors or fundraising staff and they operate out of the distance. And so we can, we can still be people centered, you know, as people interact with our organizations by honoring them and their attention span, you know, their journey with us as an organization. One of the most practical things that I've found is looking at a giving environment and looking for the ways to remove friction for your donors as they go through a process of resonating with your values and wanting to participate in the mission. Next after and fundraise up have eight different ways that we can get rid of friction on our donation pages, things like, you know, making it mobile friendly, removing additional fields that don't add as much value as necessary for the person to finish up. And, you know, those clear calls to action as well can just show, they can shepherd someone through the process of giving. So one way I've phrased it, and this is something that I'd love to ask your listeners is how long does it take to make a $5 donation to your organization versus how long does it take to make a $5 Amazon purchase? If the answer is a lot longer and 100 more steps, you're less likely to beat Amazon in the attention economy that we find ourselves in. Oh my gosh, I think that you must be a sole brother of our executive producer because he brings Kevin Pace, he brings that up all the time. You know, we have already a trained constituency via courtesy of Amazon. And so if you can understand what that actual transaction process is then that will help you to understand how you can connect easier with anybody. And I'm fascinated by this because you're talking about your values and you're talking about culture. And at the same time, we're walking a tightrope in our country, really across the world. You know, we're incredibly divided, we have civil unrest, we have poor behavior on both sides, all sides, any sides. How do you mitigate all of these things that are going on right now in our climate? Or do you just say we're gonna bless and release and let go of a particular group and just funnel down tight into the group that we know? Follow us, or what is it that you, how do you navigate that, I guess? Yeah, absolutely. So if you follow a number of internet marketers, you'll find that the easy way to gain attention is to structure everything as life is a battle between good people and evil people. And as a Christian, I believe that each of us has a choice to respond well or poorly to the situation that we've been given. It's not so much that it's this tribe versus that tribe or it's us versus them or the red versus blue or all of these different dichotomies that are thrown at us in today's culture. We get to authentically interact with the person that's ahead of us. And that's what's most important at the end of the day because again, from my worldview, we're both made in the image of God and our value is similar due to that external standard. So you're not, you're in essence preaching to the choir or you are opening it up to everybody? Because I think this is a really interesting discussion because it's like, if you're an animal welfare charity, do you just only speak to people who you know like animals and you just let loose the rest and say forget about it? Or do you keep trying to steward new engagement? It's a really interesting question. Sure, we can say lots of things and I'll get to our second point here too in my response to the question. As I was prepping for this, I came across this quote from Eleanor Roosevelt where she says, one's philosophy is not best expressed in words, it's expressed in the choices one makes. And in the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. So I see that with many small Christian nonprofits where the founders just authentically live out their values, right? They're a social service organization or an animal welfare organization. And every time that they go out and interact with their clients, their stakeholders, their donors, their partners, their technology providers, they live those values out and people are drawn to the authentic living out of values. And so that's something that we can intentionally foster within the rest of the staff, especially in fundraising. One client that I worked with in, they're based out of Texas. It's a parenting character development organization and their founder has habits of speech that she trains parents on how to instill character traits in their children. One way that she does this is say, each time you see your child doing something good, generous, helpful, thoughtful, it's not enough to just say, good job. You want to say, I saw you being generous today. And I know that because you did X, Y and Z. And so when I was working with their executive director and they were hiring a new fundraising staff, we identified that pattern of speech and said, look, every time your fundraiser interacts with a donor, make sure that you look for opportunities to use those same patterns of speech that encounter values for your donors. Without that, we can end up being founder-led instead of mission-led. I've worked in an organization in the past where I've talked to some donors and they said, man, we loved it when the founder called us, but what do you guys do? And I think that was a miss because they were so enamored with the founder, they didn't understand the transfer to the values of the organization. Right, it's a big issue. Founder syndrome and the charismatic nature of fundraising. And Jarrett and I have talked about that a lot is when that charismatic leader, whether it be the CEO, board chair or fund development, later when they leave, your organization can really be in a shambles because you've lost that link. And so I'm fascinated by this discussion. I want to move on and ask you another question about taking this same concept and sharing those values, but putting it into fundraising collateral. I mean, a lot of organizations that used to spend a lot of money on print collateral are now moving it to digital collateral. And I'm wondering how you see that working or what new things that we should be doing. Sure, so again, like we were talking about with the founder who had a big personality who people love to hear from them, but the donors actually didn't understand what the long-term strategic outcomes of the organization were. That was a breakdown of the values translated into the collateral that they could access at any time. And so when we go about creating a value proposition, we can ask some key questions, things like who is our ideal donor? Again, that gets at our values. What are the stakes of our mission? And which gets at why now a little bit further? Question three is why are we unique as opposed to similar organizations, whether we serve a different geographic area or one that is taking a little different tax to the issue. And then finally, the question why now gets at the urgency of your value proposition. So I always tell people, my friend Bill McKendry from this area of Michigan wrote Do More Good. And he reminds people, and so we're saying it from the same hymn book I guess, that your audience will not get tired of your messaging like you will. I call it seeing with full-time eyes versus your audience sees your message in your website, your collateral, if we're lucky, our direct mail efforts, they see them with eight second eyes or two second eyes in some cases. And so 100% of our new followers haven't heard your message before, even though this might be the 95th time that you brought it to the front. That's a great point. And I get so tired of seeing the same thing that I'm seeing, right? Because I'm seeing it full-time eyes. And I love that you just shifted and reframed this for me because after 20 years in this business, I feel like, come on, there's gotta be another way to say this, right? Like, there's gotta be another way to entrench our values when it comes to storytelling to make an impact for the mission. But thank you, because you have given me the biggest gift to say, you know what? Yes, you see it full-time and probably full-time plus, plus, plus, right? Because we're writing it, we're editing it, we're, you know, all of that good stuff. But when it comes to so much noise in our community right now, and it's coming at so many different angles, eight seconds would be a gift. But you're right, it's probably more like two. It's a, I think we get fatigued, you know, with our own things. And then we forget that our constituency is not fatigued by it because they are, to your point, bombarded with things. And there is a very short attention span. And if we are continuously recreating that messaging, we're starting all over versus reinforcing it. So yeah, you know, creating something and crafting something that's strong, but staying the course, is I think always the best investment. But I think to your point, John, it's been an interesting time because we're adding in this tech layer. And so we're having to say, okay, well, how do we, you know, is it just, we use the same colors or we use the same type? I mean, no, it's not that simple. We have video, we have audio. I mean, we have AI. It's a very interesting time to be looking at some of these differences. We don't have a lot of time left, speaking of time, but I'm really curious. I mean, if you could get out that crystal ball and that's probably sitting on your desk, shine it up. Where do you see, I mean, look around, look around. Where do you see the opportunities moving forward? Let's say in the next year, three years, five years. Sure. So one of the things that I work with, with faith-based organizations in right now is they have an aging donor base. And my friend Michelle pointed this statistic out to me is, one, there's gonna be a generational turnover, but two, and this is very, very significant because there's gonna be a, right before the generational turnover of wealth and asset-based giving and a lot of these planned giving and legacy giving opportunities, there's gonna be a pause where since the average age of women exceeds that of men by seven to 10 years, there's gonna be a pause where a vast majority of high-net-worth individuals who are giving to your organizations are gonna be solely women. And so that's something that nonprofits can't ignore. And again, the ways in which we communicate are large-scale opportunities, complex gifts, charitable planning, those things, they need to be human-centered to the person that's across the table. And I think there's a major opportunity for people that understand how to get and hold attention in the digital economy, but then also shepherd people through a complex process of asset-based giving because if we just continue to rely on this 1.25 ROI of our direct mail program, it's gonna break down eventually. And so we have to be proactive in sharing our values with those people that are stakeholders. If I may, John, I would love to elaborate on that for our viewers and our listeners when it comes to the power philanthropy for females. And I've done several topic conversations on this. So for that female category, right? Typically, and you're right, females are holding a lot of wealth right now. There is a lot of wealth in the female hands. So typically women inherit from their parents as well as inherit from their partner. And then now many women are also making their own wealth. And so there is this huge amount of wealth in women and as well as women making a lot of the decisions. And I'm curious, and I know we don't have a lot of time, I'm curious how we might- We'll do the next show on this. I know how we might start to change our language, our vernacular to speak to the female person, right? Like, do you dive into that? Absolutely, sure. So yeah, having only 90 seconds, I'll- I know. Get to it very quickly here. So one of the frameworks that I work with nonprofits on is called the Blue Chip Ministry Framework from a wealth advisor called Tony Emeradio. He runs select portfolio management out in California. And he talks about this. He says men are much more motivated by the tax savings by the different strategies that you can do. And when, like we've been talking about when you can find ways to help females encounter your values, your mission, the stories of impact, oftentimes that's as motivating as telling a man that you're going to save X dollars on your tax strategy. So one of the key questions that I ask from his framework is how does our organization intentionally foster organic interaction with our culture during the development effort? That's a huge question. And can we ask that of our entire staff? Because let's face it, everybody's online, everybody's a fundraiser these days. Yeah, absolutely. Well, we'll get you on to talk about that because there's so much conversation that we can have there. And we knew that our time was gonna fly by. For those of you that may not with us in the early stage of the conversation, John DeLang, CEO, DeLang Marketing Group, very active on LinkedIn. I encourage you to check him out there. I started stalking him on LinkedIn and just every now and then we gotta get you on, we gotta get you on, we gotta get you on. And we did, we got him on. So thank you so much, John DeLang. I'm just so grateful to have you in our community and in our sector. And again, very appreciative for your time. Thank you so much for having me on. Hey, again, I'm Julia Patrick. I wanna thank my co-host, Jared Ransom, the nonprofit nerd herself. And again, I also wanna make sure that we give our tremendous gratitude to all of our presenting sponsors, Blumerang American Nonprofit Academy, your part-time controller, Be Generous, Fundraising Academy at National University, Staffing Boutique, Nonprofit Thought Leader and Nonprofit Nerd. These are the folks that join us day in and day out so we could hear from somebody like John DeLang and get some really interesting insights on how we can be better stewards of not only our donors money and investment, but of our organizational leadership. And as we remind ourselves, our viewers, our listeners, our guests, stay well so you can do well. We'll see you back here tomorrow, everyone.